


Fragments of Stardusters

by Mairieux, Youmeanjosh



Category: Phandom
Genre: AU, Angst, Break Up, Completed, Fluff, Fluffy Angst, M/M, Parents, School, Shower Sex, Teacher AU, TeacherXTeacher, angsty fluff, handjob, just fuck me up, sofie and i are dead, this story ended, we are not ok
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-05
Updated: 2015-05-07
Packaged: 2018-03-21 07:48:03
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 15
Words: 41,610
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3683997
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mairieux/pseuds/Mairieux, https://archiveofourown.org/users/Youmeanjosh/pseuds/Youmeanjosh
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In which they are boring-ass teachers with a boring-ass relationship. In which they are supposed to be history, but then it didn’t look like it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. It's funny

**Author's Note:**

> Alice: Okay so, uh, this is a fic with sof(who needs to breathe). I know. Anyways, slight hint on the story: d&p are exes who crossed each other on the same school and they kinda(maybe, who knows) like each other still. that’s all. take it sof. ヽ(͡◕ ͜ʖ ͡◕)ﾉ idk enjoy our child(we named him patrick).
> 
> Sofie: YES as alice said we are doing a collab fic (you don’t say) and i’m super excited. I’m honoured to write this with alice because she is an amazing writer, bless. That’s pretty much it, enjoy our fic. (ﾉ◕ヮ◕)ﾉ*:･ﾟ✧
> 
> (originally posted by [constipatedhowell](http://constipatedhowell.tumblr.com) and [athletichowell](http://athletichowell.tumblr.com) from tumblr)

Daniel Howell stared at the clock on the wall. But not only the clock stared back, but so did thirty-three pairs of eyes. It was his third year of being a teacher, yet having a new batch still manages to shake his knees.

“I would truly appreciate it if you called me Mr. Howell.” He choked, placing his hands on top of his desk as he announced himself.

“But he’d appreciate it more if you called him nerd.” A voice chimed in from the open door that made his eyebrow twitch. “Haven’t you heard of closing the door?”

“Mr. Lester, I’d appreciate it if you won’t interrupt my class.”

“Oh come on Daniel.” The man stepped inside. “I’m Phil Lester, by the way. Your teacher’s _best friend_.”

Dan groaned at him. But the man was already away, leaving the class with laughter that sounded like death to his ears.

_Fuck this class._

“Sir, is it true?” One girl asked, her mouth still twitching as she tried to compose herself from giggling.

“What’s true?” Their teacher answered, slightly unsure on what she meant.

“Are you best friends with Mr. Lester?”

The adult snickered at the thought of being best friends with him.

He  _hated_  Philip Lester.

“I don’t know.” He replied, before anything else comes into his mind.  “Now, hurry. We have to start music class.”

The class buzzed as they worked through their assessment, leaving Dan alone with his thoughts.

‘That bastard fucking hurt me.’ He stared at the distant wall opposite him. ‘As if we would be anything near  _best friends_.’

What’s weird, is that he still feels it. Those fluttering butterflies.

But you know, those butterflies fly with rage; bringing fire along their tails.

Because that’s how it is whenever you see someone who cheated on you.

* * *

Dan stepped out from the classroom and locked the door behind him. He let the keys slip down his pocket and sighed in relief as he realised that it was finally lunch break.  His stomach growled angrily when he hurried into the teacher’s lounge to drop off and sort his papers out before he could go eat.

He stopped in front of the teacher’s lounge door and took a deep breath. He prayed to the god almighty that Phil wouldn’t be in there, trying to start a conversation on him again.

It was so extremely frustrating to have to work with that bastard. To see each other every day really got on his nerves. He was so angered over that Phil always was trying to talk to him like they were friends.   
  
They were not friends and  _they never would be_.

He huffed out the breath he was holding in and opened the door. To his relief, he couldn’t spot Phil where he usually was sat.  
  
“Phew.” He whispered to himself and hurried over to his own workplace. He loosened his grip of the papers he was holding under his arm and let them slip out on the desk. Some of the papers slid off of the desk and he let out an annoyed groan as he bent down to pick them up.

He collected them and gripped the table to heave himself up again. When he got back up he carefully put the papers back on the desk, making sure that nothing flew away again.

He started to sort the papers out, trying to hurry as much as he could. He didn’t have much time until the next lesson started and he really, really didn’t want to approach Phil right now.   
  
The door to the room was suddenly swung open, and no one less than Phil Lester stepped inside. He looked like he still was in his usual happy mood today, and Dan cursed under his breath.   
  
_Jesus fucking christ._

He tried to make himself as small as possible and clenched his teeth when he noticed that the papers was a mess spread all over his desk and that it would probably take a few more minutes for him to be done.

There was no way he was going to able to slip out of this one.

Though it didn’t seem like Phil had noticed him yet and he sped up his work. Maybe, but only maybe, would he be able to finish in time and burst out before he sees him.

He looked down at his paper, working as fast as he could. But being stressed out just resulted in him placing the papers in the wrong folder and an increasing lower mood.

Suddenly a hand was placed in front of him on his desk, making him jump and accidentally throw the papers he was currently holding behind him so they spread out all over the floor again.

“What the-” He growled and looked up to see who it was. To his great annoyance it was Phil.   
  
_Of course._  
  
“Hello, nerd.” Phil laughed. Dan rolled his eyes and sighed loudly as he turned around to pick up the papers he just threw all over the lounge.

“What the hell do you want?” He groaned as he dropped to his knees on the floor again.

“I just wanted to ask you if you’ve had lunch yet, and if not, I wonder if you wanted some? I have a spare sandwich for you.” Phil threw the sandwich he held in his hand on the desk and weighted against the desk with his hand as he studied Dan as he crawled around there on the floor.

“No.” Dan said as he got back up again and slammed the papers just a few inches away from Phil’s fingertips. “And I get my own food, thank you very much.”

“Are you sure?”   
  
Dan glared at him like he was stupid.  
  
“Yes, I’m pretty darn sure. Can you leave me alone now?” He snapped and Phil’s happy expression faded.   
  
“I’m just trying to be friendly Dan, you don’t have to be so rude towards me all the time.” Phil let go of the desk and his head fell. “I miss the times when you were your real, friendly and lovely self towards me.”

Dan snorted loudly.

“You know, Phil,” He sneered. “We were never a thing.”   
  
Phil tilted his head to the side and blinked in confusion.   
  
“What do you mean?”  
  
He looked so incredibly stupid, Dan just wanted to shove him out of the room and lock the door. But instead, he just shook his head and let out an amused breath.  
  
“What we had was just lust, okay?” He continued. “ _We_  never existed. It wasn’t anything _real_. Stop thinking that we are like ex boyfriends or some shit like that, because we aren’t. It was  _nothing_.”

Dan could see how the words slowly sunk in and when the words hit Phil, an unknown expression flashed in his eyes.   
  
“Oh.” Phil simply said and started to fiddle with his hands. “Okay, then.”

“Yes, now leave.” Dan grunted and return his gaze to the messy desk again.   
“Bye then.” Phil huffed out and Dan could hear him walk away. He didn’t answer him, but hoped that he would be out of here soon so he could eat. As soon as he was out of sight, he expressed his annoyance over the conversation with a groan.

After a few minutes, he had _finally_  sorted all of the papers. His gaze travelled over the desk to see if there was anything he had missed. As he did so, he noticed that there was a sandwich laying just in front of him. How the hell could he have missed that?   
  
He sighed in annoyance as he realised that it was probably Phil that had put it there.

He grabbed the sandwich and studied it for a bit. His stomach growled in response to his action, begging him to eat it.

He hesitated for a second. He was so incredibly hungry and he didn’t have the energy to go pick something up himself. His time was limited as well, so he didn’t really have the time to do it either.

He looked up and studied the room to see if Phil had left. His work place gaped empty, so Dan fell back into his comfortable chair and looked at the sandwich again.

His stomach let out another growl and he decided to eat it.

He carefully removed the plastic film and took a bite. As he chewed it, a nice taste spread in his mouth.

He couldn’t help but smile as he took the second bite.   
_  
Phil is such a fucking loser._

* * *

Phil wasn’t exactly a man of complete thoughts. He prefers sudden bursts of moments and ideas.

Maybe that’s why he has known for being creative.

But what’s happening to his life right now isn’t exactly giving him answers. He’s dumfounded, probably.

He wants to know why Dan is being such a prick, yet all his mind comprehends about it is static.

He knew, deep down, that he hurt him. But he’s scared; but of what exactly?

An attempt on being an adult, that’s obviously the title of his life right now. Strange, he left his conscience pressed between the keyholes of the door as he left Dan’s room. He left those burning feelings back in highschool as the words ‘over’ and ‘us’ escaped Dan’s mouth.

But here he is; being friendly again the moment they came across each other on the same school.

He just sacrificed his  _only_  lunch to Dan and the cafeteria is no where near as an answer for it’s packed by students.

All he could do is sigh.

His stomach grumbled again, demanding fuel. Or at least to his mind it is.

He can’t focus; he tried to read his student’s homework yet it just gave his mind more blurred images. And his thoughts trail off somewhere else anyway, so doing anything that distracts him doesn’t really work.

He walks, it’s Dan.

He thinks, it’s Dan.

He  _breathes_ , it’s Dan.

Fuck, everything is Dan.

And it’s not great. Because, just as Dan said, there was never a thing. It was just some, who knows, stupid immature decision. That decision meaning them dating and declaring themselves as soulmates.

It’s surreal.

And he thought it was gone.

Until they met on the school again.

Really, Phil could see how Dan’s hair stand as they walk past, his teeth gritting and fist clenching.

Funny, they weren’t like that before.

“Hey.” A voice drowned out from his thoughts. “Hey, Lester.”

“What?” He whipped his head from the stack of books he was piling as he attempts to re-arrange the shelf found inside his class.

It was Dan.

_Fuck, he’s hallucinating now, isn’t he?_

Phil saw his eyes scan him, a small, annoying blush tinged from his sun-kissed cheeks

“What is it?” He responded; half hopeful that he wasn’t hallucinating, half-hopeful he was.

“Here.” Dan handed him a squared sandwich wrapped in a cream tissue, the logo of the school found on the left corner. “I went to the cafeteria for a proper lunch and I thought to return the sandwich you gave me.”

_Okay, maybe a trip to a psychiatrist won’t hurt his schedule._

“I- uh, thanks, I guess?” Phil replied, grabbing the snack from his hand and placed it to the part of the shelf with free space. “I’ll eat it soon.”

He could have sworn he heard a ‘like I give a shit’ under his breath.

“Listen, Phil.” He heard him start, suddenly getting firm.

“I’m listening.”

“Stop dicking around and face me.”

So he did. And he saw Dan’s face twisting to a mixture of disgust, annoyance, and anger. It was disheartening, for he knew he caused it.

“I don’t want you to talk to me anymore.” The brunet expressed, a good attempt on not sounding exasperated.

Infuriating, maybe, is the first emotion Phil felt.

He calmly ran his hand through his neatly fringed hair.

“What do you want me to do then?” He faced him, his eyes starting to burn from the tears welling up his eyes.

“Nothing.” Dan blankly answered.

And he walked away, bringing the warm wind with him.

* * *

_“You know what’s cool?” A seventeen year old brown haired boy sat down next to the figure wrapped under the duvet on his bed. He hugged him, making a kissing noise as a try to make him answer his question._

_“What?” Came the muffled voice._  
  
_“We’d do anything for each other.”_


	2. We are, aren't we?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which they are boring-ass teachers with a boring-ass relationship. In which they are supposed to be history, but then it didn’t look like it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Alice: ╰( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡° )つ──☆*:・ﾟ ah yes, patrick- i mean the chapter 2 of FOS. we did this fast bC SOF AND I ARE SO EXCITED UGHGHGH pls enjoy patrick. i love my child so much. k u go sof.
> 
> Sofie: yes, we updated our fic very quickly because we are VERY EXCITED ABOUT HOW THIS TURNS OUT! like we literally planned this entire chapter in just caps lock. (this is alice speaking: pls check my blog bc i might post how it looked like when we planned it k bye)  
> so without further ado, here is our fic. enjoy (^▽^)
> 
> (originally posted by [constipatedhowell](http://constipatedhowell.tumblr.com) and [athletichowell](http://athletichowell.tumblr.com) from tumblr)

Dan threw the door to the teacher’s lounge open, slightly out of breath. He had overslept this morning and since he absolutely hated to be late, this morning had been very stressful.

He was met by a couple of shocked expressions as they looked over at his direction to see who it was that burst into the room this violent.

Dan nodded apologetically against everyone and greeted them with a “good morning”. They nodded in understanding and answered with mumbled “morning”s back.

He shot a quick smile towards them and hurried to his desk. To his relief, his papers wasn’t as messy as they used to be this morning and that would buy him more time.

He glanced over to the clock on the wall and cursed rather loudly over how little time he had left until his lesson started.

He was  _not_ going to give his students the honour to tease him for being late. That was one of the things he hated the most, students who thought they were so  _amazingly_ clever for putting it out there that he was late.

It wasn’t like he knew it already, huh?

He gathered the necessary papers for the lesson and looked them through, making sure that he had gotten everything right. But due to the stressful state he was in at the moment, he struggled with thinking clear.

He got even more stressed out over the fact that he couldn’t focus, but tried to calm himself with the fact that he could go back and get the missing papers later if it was necessary.

He looked over to the clock again, stuffed all of the things he was bringing under his arm and hurried out from the teacher’s lounge.

As he got out of the door, he collided with another teacher who was on his way into the room.

A muffled sound escaped from both of them and Dan held on to his stuff with his dear life as he tried to regain balance. This was not the best of times to drop all of his stuff.

“In a hurry, Howell?” The man he collided with, called Alex, laughed out as he corrected his shirt.   
  
Dan could feel his already bad mood get even worse.   
  
“Good job figuring that one out, sherlock.” He muttered in response and Alex let out another amused laugh as Dan quickly walked past him, muttering something unhearable under his breath.

After a few moments of angry power-walking down the corridor, he approached his classroom. The students sat outside, and as they noticed that he was there, they all sighed in frustration.

A smirk spread across Dan’s face.

“You thought the class was cancelled, didn’t you?” He mocked as he unlocked the classroom. As they walked past him to enter the room he got several groans in response and that amused him.

He was just about to enter the classroom and start the lesson as he heard something that caught his attention from across the corridor.

“Isn’t that your boyfriend?” A girls voice was heard from inside the room and Dan got a bit curious too as if it was directed to him since he had just walked past.  
  
“One second.” He announced to his class who sat behind their desks, waiting for him to start the lesson. They nodded towards him and he walked over to the other classroom.

On his way there, he heard the laugh belonging to Phil Lester.

He clenched his teeth as he realised what it was all about. They were teasing him for that thing Phil said to him the other day about Dan being his best friend, and now they had taken it to a whole new level.

He appeared in the door and all the eyes was directed towards him, as well as Phil’s.

The smile from the previous laugh lingered on Phil’s face as he met Dan’s eyes, and that infuriated Dan.

He shot him a death glare and the smile on Phil’s face faded. When it had disappeared completely, Dan snorted and turned around and returned to his own class, muttering about stupidity and Phil.

* * *

“Okay class, we are going to continue where we finished yesterday. Start your computers and continue with your essays, keep in mind that the deadline is next week on Friday!” Phil told the students and watched as they brought up their computers from their backpacks.

“And if you need any help, just raise your hand!”

He hummed happily as he tur ned around to write the deadline down on the whiteboard, when he noticed the students who sat outside of the classroom across the corridor.

He wondered why their teacher hadn’t arrived yet, and he considered going over there to ask them which teacher they had and then go look for him or her.

He was just about to do it, when their teacher turned up and unlocked the door.

A sharp pain cut through his stomach.

Oh, it was Dan.

The familiar sinking feeling he felt every time he saw Dan returned and he sighed. If he had been forced to go look for Dan, he would have an excuse to talk to him. Dan would probably not have liked it at all, but it was Phil’s duty to do it in those situations so it would be unfair if he would be angry at him for it.

“Sir,” A girl’s voice snickered and that snapped him out of his thoughts and he turned around. “Isn’t that your boyfriend?”

It took a few seconds for him to understand what she was asking and when he realised, he laughed. He was just about to answer when he noticed that everyones gazes turned their attention towards the door. He turned around as well, curious to what was drawing everyone’s attention away from him.

His breath stuck in his throat when he saw that it was Dan.

_Oh shit, did he hear what she said?_

The angry glare that Dan gave Phil caught him off guard. He felt exposed and vulnerable, and wanted nothing more than to just sink through the floor.

_Yep, he definitely heard it._

The smile on Phil’s face disappeared and when Dan noticed it, a snort erupted from him and he around and left.

Phil gulped and turned around to face his students that seemed very confused over what just happened.

“Uhm, return to your work, nothing to see here.” He laughed nervously and the confused students returned their gazes to their computer screens, quietly whispering to each other.

Phil sighed and returned to write the deadline down on the whiteboard.

_He fucked up._

* * *

“Morning.” Phil greeted to his co-workers on the lounge; everyone was present except for a certain music teacher.

“Hey Phil,” A rather obnoxious voice called from behind, it was Gilbert. “Didn’t go to work with your boyfriend?”

“What?” The english teacher furrowed his brows.

“You know,  _Daniel_?” The man cackled loudly.

“We…we are not together.” Phil answered at the calmest voice he could muster.

“Oh?” Gilbert raised an eyebrow. “You wouldn’t want him to hear that then.”

He wiggled his shoulder to his left to which Phil looked at, and sure as he was, Dan was standing there; a scowl decorating his face.

“Dan!” Phil choked.

“Uh-oh, someone’s going to get a fight.” Gilbert laughed again. But stopped when he saw Dan’s incoming fist.

“Yeah, you.” Dan gritted his teeth and aimed to the annoying man’s face but was halted by a firm hand. Phil’s.

“I’m going to punch you later,” He droned. “I’m just doing the VIP first.”

Phil could have laughed at him. But he knew he’ll be dead by the next minute if he did.

It seems that Dan hasn’t changed from his old persona of being a troublemaker, always getting into fight that gave him bruises and cuts that Phil used to tend back then.

He shuddered at the memory, now is not exactly the time for this.

“Howell.” Phil muttered with a warning tone.

And Dan looked at him; and that’s where he realised that he hasn’t indeed changed.

His eyes still looking like warm honey dripping to chocolate, golden specks of caramel pooling everywhere.

He looked at him with those eyes. Fear.

Just like he did before, whenever he could feel a fight starting.

Then his eyes would wrinkle and change into an expression of anger and fury.

It was still Dan.

The old Dan he had.

_Had._

Because he may still act like his teenage years, he’s still an adult.

He’s changed.

LIke for example, his rage directed to Phil.

“Fuck off.” Dan mumbled, the words coming out of his mouth with pure disgust and irritation.

Phil saw him drop the fist and shake his hand off before storming out the lounge, dragging his supplies with him.

“What the hell was that?” He heard Gilbert foolishly ask who had stumbled on his feet when Dan lounged at him earlier.

Phil angled his head at him, his mouth straight and eyes emitting his sickened emotion. “As  _he_  had said, Fuck off.”

He didn’t say anything else, but he ran out the room.

His mind doesn’t know where, but his feet knew.

His mind knew he shouldn’t, but his feet doesn’t know how to stop.

He found himself outside the music room, door closed as it drowned out the melodic tune of a piano.

He shivered again as his fingers ghosted over the doorknob, hesitant and trembling.

Phil sucked the air in front of him.

_What was there to be scared about?_

Oh nothing, except but to face your ex who you know is crying as his tears fell to the piano keys whilst he played.

“Phil.” A monotonous voice susurrated. “I know you are outside the door.”

A giggle almost escaped his lips again and he pried the door open gently, as if it would break. Even if he knew who exactly was the one broken here.

“You know me too well.” Phil mumbled in an undertone.

“I know.” Dan replied, not looking at him still as his fingers continued his song.

“What piece?” The coal-haired inquired, ignoring the cold and dead air between them.

“Ingenue.”

_Oh._

“Listen Dan-” Phil tried to say but was cut off with the sudden slam of Dan’s hands pressing hard on the piano.

“I want you to forget my existence.” Dan murmured, still not facing Phil.

Sure, Phil can’t see him. And he’s glad; because  _also_  knows him too well. He knows him too well enough to see from behind that there were tears falling to his sun-kissed cheeks. He’s glad because if he sees him crying, his feet won’t work again and rush to him. Then his hands would do the SOP of wrapping an arm around Dan’s waist and the other hand to his cheek as he kissed his tears away.

Because he knows that’s nowhere near possible.

“Dan, I’m-”

“WHY WON’T YOU UNDERSTAND?!” Dan barked and finally looked at him. And sure enough, there were tear stains and water still trickled on the corners of his eyes.

Phil’s feet itched. It twitched.

_Your soulmate is calling you._

He couldn’t help it anymore. His legs turned on auto-pilot and there were no brakes to pull.

He was by Dan’s side in seconds.

Then he lifted his arms, ready to do the next step. But then stopped.

“No, please.” Dan whispered, almost like a ghost. “No more.”

“ _Daniel_ , just for now, please, let me.” Phil said softly and wound his arms around Dan. “You know I hated seeing your crying face.”

But Dan just sniffled and choked on another sob.

“I don’t understand it Phil, I don’t want you to touch me right now. My skin is jumping every time your fingers held me but I can’t push you away.” He breathed and placed a hand on Phil’s cheek.

“You don’t have to.” Phil answered and planted a kiss to his temple. He had his other hand wiping off the tears that pooled on Dan’s eyes and cheeks, feeling the warm liquid against his skin.

It was until the last second when he realised that Dan removed his hand from his face and to his neck instead, his lips only inches away. It was until he felt the electric shock he had inside his chest as their lips collided, blurring his thoughts.

But Dan pulled away immediately and touched his lips, as if to check if what happened just now was real.

“Dan, I’m sorry I-”

Yet Dan already left the room.

* * *

Dan stared at his half-eaten sandwich, waves of sickness washing over him every time he thought about eating one more bit.

He sighed and weighed on his elbows, resting his forehead against his tied hands.

There was no point in trying to eat the rest, his stomach was too worked up from the situation earlier.

Everything is Phil’s fault. Why couldn’t he just forget about him and leave him alone?

Dan didn’t need him in his life. What happened between them in high school was just a stupid teenage romance that didn’t mean anything. He just wished that Phil would understand that.

He got up from his desk and brought the stupid sandwich with him. He took as few steps as he was able to reach the trash bin, since he didn’t want to be in Phil’s presence.

It was so annoying to be in the same lounge as him. Since there are two teachers’ lounges so everyone can have their own reasonable space to work with, there was a 50/50 chance that Dan wouldn’t end up with Phil.

But he did, of course, have the usual luck to end up in the same room as him. And therefore, he had to feel annoyed and anxious  _everytime_  he entered that stupid lounge.

Not to mention, it made it easier for Phil to talk with him whenever he wanted to, and Dan didn’t want him to have that freedom.

He was just about to walk back to his desk when Gilbert suddenly stood up from his desk and shouted his name.

Dan couldn’t quite tell who was calling his name so he turned around and searched for possible eye contact with the one who wanted him something. His eyes locked with Gilbert’s from across the room.

He was stood besides Phil, and Phil was staring at Dan with wide eyes and a scared expression.

Gilbert made a hand motion that signaled Dan to come over where he stood and Dan narrowed his eyes at him.

It seemed like Gilbert was very amused by this situation, telling from the wide smile that was on his face. He made another exaggerative hand motion and Dan rolled his eyes.

He clenched his fists and walked over to figure out what the hell he wanted to say so badly. If it had anything to do with Phil, he didn’t know what he would do.

“What is it?” He said as calmly as he could, still holding his fists still clenched by his sides. He completely ignored Phil, who seemed to be watching him where he sat.

“I need you two to work together for a project.” Gilbert said, the smile still on his face as he handed a paper containing instructions to both of them.

Phil grabbed it immediately but Dan just glared at the paper, not making an effort to grab it.

“Are you  _fucking kidding me_?” Dan growled through gritted teeth as he looked up at Gilbert’s face.

He is doing this on purpose. He planned this project just to make Dan and Phil work together, and Dan had never been wanting to wipe a smile off someone’s face that bad before. He had to use all his willpower not to swing that clenched fist of his towards Gilbert’s satisfied face.

“I’m not kidding, this is completely serious.” Gilbert tried to sound firm, but his mocking intentions shone through. “You are going to start with it next week; the students you are going to handle has already been informed about this.”   
Great, so the students are involved in this too, huh?

“I don’t think this is a very good idea.” Phil’s voice erupted from behind and it sounded so sad and pathetic, Dan had to clench his teeth even harder not to scream right there and then.

Jesus, he was  _so annoying_.

“There is no way to get out of this, boys. You are doing it whether you want or not.” Gilbert said and flailed the paper in front of Dan face in an attempt to make him grab it.

Dan snapped it out of Gilbert’s hand hard, almost hitting him. He wrapped his hand around it, resisting the temptation to make it into a ball and throw it in his stupid face.

“You can start right away if you want.” Gilbert smiled and winked not-so-discreetly at Dan.

“Fuck off.” He muttered at Gilbert and then shot Phil a hard glance, who seemed startled by the sudden motion.

Dan then turned around and walked towards his desk again, cursing Gilbert and Phil under his breath. 

* * *

_“Are you two boyfriends?” A boy derided, standing in front of his little gang of friends. They chuckled behind him, obviously finding the leader of the group funny._

_Dan stood with his arm wrapped around Phil’s shoulders and weighted against him. He turned to look at Phil who looked back with a confused expression, begging him to answer them._

_Dan huffed out a laugh and placed a kiss on Phil’s mouth, who flashed a heartwarming smile._

_“Yes, we are.”_


	3. Maybe

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which they are boring-ass teachers with a boring-ass relationship. In which they are supposed to be history, but then it didn’t look like it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Alice: Hi guysss pls enjoy the third ch of Patrick- I mean FOS. sry if it’s so short. sof was pretty busy yesterday so we lacked time to write. anyhoo, ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)
> 
> Sofie: yahh, we really wanted to update the story so we rushed this one a little bit but we promise that it will get better!! enjoy ╰(✿˙ᗜ˙)੭━☆ﾟ.*･｡ﾟ
> 
> (originally posted by [constipatedhowell](http://constipatedhowell.tumblr.com) and [athletichowell](http://athletichowell.tumblr.com) from tumblr)

Maybe it was the way how Dan looked at him.

Or maybe it was how his fingers trembled as he held the paper Gilbert gave him.

But honestly?

Phil just wants to die.

* * *

“So, I want you to flip open your notebooks. We’re going to start on a new lesson.” Phil announced as soon as he gets into class. “And it’s about one of my favourite authors, Oscar Wilde.”

He decided to act as energetic as he could be to liven up his class about Oscar but his thoughts don’t seem to wander off Dan again.

“Oscar Wilde was found gay and then was sent to prison due to gross indecency…” He continued with a shake of his head, as if to shake away his thoughts that’s distracting his job.

Then he realised that he can’t.

“I guess it’s a great idea to stop from his life story for now. We will continue with his works tomorrow.” He told his class as he turned off his presentation. “For now, I want you to read the excerpt of The Portrait of Dorian Grey in your books on page 199.”

The class went on quietly as the students sat in silence whilst their teacher stared at them hazily.

‘Maybe I need to talk to him about it.’ Phil thought with a silent snort. Then he remembered yesterday, Dan’s soft lips on his, felt as if it was high school again.

But it’s not.

Cheers to reality, say goodbye to Phil’s static fantasy.

Dan was confused, he knows that. He can see it in his eyes as tears dropped.

Once again, he doesn’t know if it’s his fault.

Well yeah, he hurt Dan. But Dan is the one hurting himself by pushing Phil away.

He kept on forcing his brain to the thought that Phil was going to hurt him. Which will never happen. Not even again because, in sheer honesty, Phil never hurt him.

Dan was the one who said they should stop.

Dan was the one who left.

Dan was was the one who hurt.

But these thoughts are for another day. He has to work with Dan on a project, the school’s tradition.

Well not exactly a project, but more of a competition. Classes merge together as a single group with two teachers working as their leaders. The group that gets any form of product/work, may it be in the form of art or dance or literature, closest to the theme wins.

No big deal.

Except for the theme this year.

Phil opened his third drawer on the desk and pulled out the said paper announcing about the event.

His eyes skimmed over the details and his heart clenched again as he read the theme.

_‘How memories improve your future.’_

Maybe death is just simply inevitable for him now.

* * *

A frustrated groan escaped Dan’s lips as he finished reading the information through for the fourth time. He ran his hand through his fringe and clenched his fist hard around the already crumpled paper.

Gilbert just paired them for his and the rest of the schools amusement and Dan knew that. What was so fascinating about it anyway? He and Phil matched as well as day and night, and there was  _no way_  this project would work if they didn’t try their hardest to cooperate.

That was the exact opposite to what Dan wanted to do at this moment, having to cooperate with Phil. But since that is the only way to do it, he might as well go and talk to Phil about it right now.

While he power-walked down the corridor to find Phil’s classroom, he mentally prepared himself for the way Phil would respond to him.

If Dan knew him right, he would probably try to look at the bright side of this situation. Dan didn’t quite understand how it would be possible to see anything positive about this at all. Phil would have to be extremely skilled to find something good about this that actually convinced Dan that they would make it through this without suffering.

The fact alone that the theme of this project was ‘How memories improve your future’ made him annoyed.

He didn’t want to remember. The past was the past and if your mind lingers there too much, you will eventually lose grip of the present. That was something he had learned from personal experience and it was from there he decided that he wouldn’t waste his time thinking about what has happened, but instead live now.

And that was obviously something that Phil wasn’t able to do, since he refuses to get over the ‘thing’ he and Dan had in the past.

Which, by the way, didn’t even mean anything.

It was also so extremely ironic that Gilbert would put them together, wasn’t it?

He probably made the stupid theme up just so he and the other teachers could have a little giggle over the coffee at the thought of having Dan and Phil working together in a project which included thinking about your glorious past and make the best out of it.

Dan saw the classroom where Phil was approaching at the end of the corridor, and he prayed that the students weren’t in there. He really,  _really_  didn’t want to see the amused smile on the students faces as they whispered to each other, giggling over ‘ohh how cute they were together’.

When he heard the distant sounds of chairs dragging across the floor, he realised that there was no way he was going to be able to avoid it and he hissed quietly. After a few moments they started to well out from the classroom, in a hurry to the next class they had.

Dan avoided their glances since he knew what they probably were thinking about when they saw him move against Phil’s classroom.

He muttered something under his breath to distract himself from thinking too much about it and took a deep breath when he got to the open door into the classroom.

“Phil, do you have a minute?” He sighed, using all his willpower not to sound annoyed or sarcastic.

“I guess.” A monotonous voice was heard and Dan clenched his teeth.

This was not going to be as easy as he thought.

“So,” Dan said as he stepped into the classroom. Phil stood by his desk and read something that looked like Oscar Wilde.

“Are you reading Oscar Wilde?” Dan asked, not being able to hold the curiosity in his tone back.

“Yeah.”

A smile found it’s way across Dan’s face, but he quickly shook it off before Phil could see it.

Dan cleared his throat, snapping back to the seriousness of the situation.

“Right, well, I came here to discuss the little problem we have here, also known as the _project_.” He said harshly.

Phil looked up from his book and threw Dan a seemingly uninterested glance.

“Ah yes, it is a problem indeed, since I’m not allowed to talk to you.” Phil tried to answer back just as harsh, but Dan could hear that he trembled.

Dan groaned loudly.

“ _Why_  are you bringing that up in  _this_  particular situation?” He could feel the annoyance rise inside of him. If Phil was going to act like this the entire time, he was seriously considering quitting his job for good.

Phil opened his mouth to answer, but shut it again shortly after. He looked down on his book again and sighed.

“I just don’t want to hurt you, you know.” He mumbled.

Dan rolled his eyes so hard that he thought that they were going to pop out of his skull and he had to bite back a sarcastic comment that probably wouldn’t make things better right now.

“Why can’t you just  _try_  to cooperate with me now?” He huffed out instead. “We both obviously suffer equally much from this, so we might as well try to make it as least painful as possible.”

Phil shrugged.

“Well, you are the one who keeps pushing me away, and now you are coming to me asking me to cooperate with you. How does that make any sense?”

A growl of frustration erupted from Dan.

“Do whatever the fuck you want.” He shook his head. “It’s entirely up to you if you are going to be stubborn like that. But remember that this will be even more painful to go through if you are.”

The coal-haired snorted.  “When this project ends, I’ll definitely forget your existence, just like how you told me yesterday.”

Dan could feel his breathing race.

* * *

The buzz of the classroom heightened as they saw their two teachers enter the room, not even noticing the look of death on their faces. They were bickering, for some reason/

“I told you to get the goddamn speaker on the audio visuals room!” Phil grumbled as he sat down his laptop on the desk.

“Well I’m sorry, I wasn’t aware you are capable of telepathy for you never told me to.” Dan snapped back and slammed the door close, startling a few students inside the class.

But most giggled.

“Here comes the married couple.” A boy cheered on the back, a smug smirk on his face.

And both men had to force a humble smile as they pictured the most grotesque way on snapping the neck.

“Why thank you for volunteering Francis, Howell and I would definitely find it endearing if you were to be a sweet child and ran to the audio visuals room to get the speakers.” Phil flashed him a grim smile and watched him scoff out the room.

“I can’t believe this.” Dan groaned beside him, his hand rubbing circles on his temple.

“Do you think the only one who doesn’t want this?” Phil gave him a straight, neutral face; blank and pale as a canvas.

The observation stopped Dan from saying anything else, and Francis has returned with a panda speaker, a taped ‘Phil Lester’ on the side of its head.

“So, I’m sure you are all aware of the annual celebratory event that occurs in our school around this time, yes?”  Dan started, gaining the attention of the class quickly. Maybe because he’s just that attractive to some.  “This time you’ll be working with…us, Lester and I.”

The room cheered and wolf-whistles boomed inside the room.

“Shh!” Phil scolded quickly, afraid that the principal would hear the commotion.

The noise died down in a minute and both men grimaced in the front.

There’s nowhere near hope on surviving this.

Maybe Gilbert can go fuck himself.

Maybe they should just kill each other.

Just, fuck this.

Or that’s what Phil at least thought as he wrote the details on the chalkboard.

* * *

_“Are you reading The Canterville Ghost?” Phil plopped down next to Dan, pecking his lips quickly._

_“Yeah.” Dan smiled at him, then turned to catch his lips in a proper kiss._

_“I loved that.”  Phil giggled softly as he wrapped his arms around Dan’s neck. “I just love Oscar Wilde.”_

_The other pouted at him. “What about me?”_

_“Hmm.” Phil pretended to think as if to to tease him. “Maybe I love Oscar more.”_

_“Fine then.” Dan faked sniffed. But couldn’t help but smile at him. “I love you.”_

_“I love you too.” The paler brought him closer, inhaling his scent. “More than Oscar Wilde.”_


	4. Hopefully

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which they are boring-ass teachers with a boring-ass relationship. In which they are supposed to be history, but then it didn’t look like it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Alice: (つ ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)つ if ure still reading this then god bless you. I hope you enjoy this one too !  
> Sofie: here is another update yoo. we are still as excited every time we post a new chapter, we are probably going to faint from it one day. enjoy! ｡◕ ‿ ◕｡ 
> 
> (originally posted by [constipatedhowell](http://constipatedhowell.tumblr.com) and [athletichowell](http://athletichowell.tumblr.com) from tumblr)

To be completely honest, the two teachers didn’t look like they were boyfriends at all.

They were always arguing and the tension between them were always thick and hateful. Everytime they entered a classroom together or was forced into interaction with each other it always ended with either one of them angrily bursting out of the room. 

It was usually Dan who got the must frustrated and angry, but this didn’t come out as a surprise since everybody knew that Dan’s mood really wasn’t so very stable.

But everyone with eyes could see that they didn’t particularly enjoy being in each others company. But there was just something about the two that made people like the idea of having them in a relationship. It wasn’t something you could explain, it just felt like they would be perfect together if they actually got along.

But it was also the fact that it seemed like it was impossible for them to ever get along over something that tempted everyone to be so enthusiastic about it. It was like when you want something very expensive, but you can’t have it just because of that particular reason.

It was that feeling that fueled the whole thing.

The rumours about it spread like wildfire when it was announced that they were going to work together with the project, and more and more people were starting to get involved in it. The class who was going to have them as their leaders was given a ‘mission’ to study and report everything romantic that happened between them as the project went on, and everyone was very interested in staying updated about the whole thing.

Even the teachers were involved with this. It was, indeed, the teachers plan to put them in the same group just because of this.   
  
Some of the teachers had been low key discussing about them before it became a big thing, but it was when a students had asked a teacher what he thought about the idea of them being together that it had been spreading to all of the teachers.

That was when Gilbert, the teacher in charge of the whole project, came up with the idea for the theme and decided to put the two together. He was the most hardcore believer of them all and loved to tease them for it, as the douchebag he was.

He found it particularly funny to tease Dan about it since he was so salty and defensive over it. It was almost to the extent that he was considering believing that they still had something going on between them, even though they showed the direct opposite of it.

Everyone knew deep down that this probably wouldn’t work, and that the two men would probably start to fight over the simplest and not be able to cooperate at all, but that didn’t stop the others from finding it very amusing.

It became so interesting to so many to the point where the class made a student go up to Dan and tell him about what they thought.

“You know, we don’t really think that this will work out.” She had giggled.

Dan frowned. “What do you mean?”

She shifted her feet and giggled again. “If you always fought with Mr. Lester we won’t do well any time soon.”

* * *

It was on that moment Phil walked in. Maybe you could say it was one of those coincidences; you know like in the movies?

Phil saw Dan’s frown worsen when he laid his eyes on him, and the girl next to him moved awkwardly back to her seat.

“What did she say?” The paler man asked lowly as he got to table where Dan was sitting at,

“Oh you know,” Dan answered through gritted teeth. “The project will never work out if we just bicker all day.”

This made Phil raise an eyebrow. “But isn’t that the truth?”

“It’s not like they can do anything about our situation.” The other added whilst he glared at the student’s working on the floor, discussing ideas on what to do about the project.

With a chair he got from an another from, Phil sat down next to Dan, even though they knew one would want to punch the other with this closeness. But then again, they are used to being close already.

Maybe Phil should just dodge the punch later.

“Say Dan,” Phil started, his voice quiet and fragile.

“What?”

“I was wondering if you’d like to have coffee.”

Dan almost laughed. “What are you talking about?”

“I mean, I want to get this project to success, even if it means to talk to you.”

“ _Philip_ , I’m afraid that will never happen.”

The black-haired man sighed; he knew Dan will say that. “It’s not like I’m asking you on a date!”

The class cheered loudly.

They heard what Phil said.

_Shit._

“Return to your works.” Dan growled as his cheeks flushed red.

“Won’t you do it for the students?”

“Phil, I told you-”

“‘I want you to stop talking to me.’” Phil mocked with a high-pitched voice. “Does it look like I still want to talk to you? After all you’ve put me through?”

 _Yes_.

“Excuse me?” Dan’s eyes widened slightly and let out a humourless chuckle. “You’re the one to talk.”

“If you could have been understanding, we would still be us.” Phil muttered with a pained voice.

“Sorry, there’s nothing to be understood when it’s obvious you never loved me.”

“I explained it so many times!” Phil frustratingly ruffled his hair, a habit he had developed back then whenever he can feel his anger growing. It used to be Dan’s hair he would ruffle, a soothing process. But Dan left, so he had to cope with his own hair.

“No matter how many times you explain, it still won’t change the past.”

“Dan if you could just actually stop being such a stubborn-”

“Oh, am I the one stubborn now?”

“I tried to show you that I still care for you until now, but you pushed it away!”

Dan could feel his fists’ knuckles turn white. “Phil, shut up.”

“I just want this to work out.” Phil mumbled softly, his eyes staring hard on his feet.

“I also do.” And there were no words after that.

The session of discussing about the project ended with the students voting between writing poems and composing a song.

The votes will be shown tomorrow, Phil mused to himself.

He stood up and erased the chalk from the board. There were loads of doodles and scribbles by random students. But one caught his eye.

_‘Lester <3 Howell’_

He turned around quickly to see if Dan’s near and erased it immediately.

The students are no help to this.

Truthfully, he just wants it to end, all of this shit happening to his life.

Most days he blames his parents, but today it’s just, he blames Dan.

Dan because he won’t listen to him.

Dan because he still feels attraction to him, even after six years since they last saw each other.

Maybe he should just resign on his job; yet this is just his first year on being a teacher, he needs experience..

After all these schools, he chose this.

_Fuck his fate, then._

He doesn’t even want to go on a date with Dan, for he knew it would just make his heart clench harder.

All he seeks is, just somewhat, friendship.

He misses those old days where he would get a good laugh for some stupid joke Dan said. He misses those days where they would stay up until 4 am playing video games. But he mostly misses where he could hug Dan, platonic or not.

Dan’s hugs are the best, for him at least.

He’s just the man that can’t move on, he knows it.

Maybe it’s because he could still feel that there is hope for them.

But right now? There isn’t.

‘Friends’ is not even near.

They are strangers, rather.

He just wants to curl up on a ball on the corner, maybe Dan would come running and tell him that it’s okay and he’ll kiss it all better.

Except that the latter is nowhere near real life.

He’s hit the end zone; too far to except that this is his life now.

Too far to realise that there was a note left on his desk.

Phil picked it up, guessing that Dan left it to remind him about their schedule.

His eyes scanned the memo and nearly dropped it.

Maybe there’s actually hope right now.

_‘Tomorrow, Shakeaway at the Mall. 3 pm’_

* * *

Dan stood behind the desk, writing down some notes whilst Phil asked the class to vote about composing a song or writing a poem for the project.

The argument he had with Phil a few moments ago whirled around in his mind, making him argue with himself about it.

What the girl told him previously was right. If they kept on fighting and arguing with each other, they would get  _nowhere_. They would probably get scolded by the students or the teachers for it, and then teased for being so domestic and cute.  

His hand ran through his hair in frustration. There must be some way through this hell that doesn’t involve as much communication as the project required. The question was just how. How were they going to do it?  
  
He has been searching for this solution ever since they got handed this project. He had even been laying awake in bed at night, trying to figure it out. But his constant brooding only led up to one answer.

The unwanted solution that crept in the back of his head made it’s way through and poisoned his mind. His fist clenched when he realised that this probably was the only way to do it.

He brought his hand up, ripped a little piece off of his notebook and grabbed his pen.

He bit his lip as he started to write it down on the little paper piece.

_‘Tomorrow, Shakeaway at the mall. 3 pm’_

The pen fell from his grip and he studied the note. He couldn’t believe that he was doing this.

By giving Phil this note, he was going to go against everything that he had said to him. He was going to let Phil get what he wants and he was going to let the teachers, as well as students, win. The trending idea of him and Phil being in a relationship that they had, would probably be even more fueled and obnoxious. This was the direct opposite of what he wanted to do, but it seems like there is no other way.

They aren’t giving him any other choice. This is exactly what they wanted him to do, that’s why they put him and Phil together in the first place.

Once again he considered quitting his job, because this was really getting on his nerves. It was reaching the point where he actually felt tired and annoyed when he thought about getting up for work in the morning.

Usually, he loved his job. He had been dreaming about working as a music teacher ever since he was a little kid because his greatest hobbies was listening to, playing and writing music.

The euphoric feeling he felt when he had gotten the job was something that he wouldn’t forget anytime soon. The feeling of success after so many years of hoping and hard work, he finally got where he wanted to be in his life. He was able to lay high school and university behind him, and instead focus on the bright future he seemed to have in front of him. It was a great achievement and he was very, very happy.

That was until he came to work one morning, and Gilbert introduced him to Phil.

Everything that he thought that he had put behind suddenly stood in front of him. With Phil, came memories. Memories that reminded him about everything that he wanted to forget, and everything he was so certain he didn’t have to face anymore.

That was when he decided that he wasn’t going to let Phil make him clench to his past.

That was why he didn’t want to talk to him, even less work with him.

As the class ended and the students got up to leave, he closed his notebook and put the note beside it. He corrected it and made sure that Phil was able to see it when he came to collect his stuff and leave. His eyes trailed over the note one more time and he shook his head in frustration.

He was so incredibly angry at Gilbert for making him do this.

* * *

_“Your name’s Philip?” Dan asked as he looked at the pale boy in front of his eyes, his eyes staring back. They were the bluest he has ever seen._

_“Yeah, but you could call me Phil.” He replied shyly._

_“Cool, I’m Daniel, but you could call me Dan.” The brown haired stuck out his hand, to which Phil hesitantly shook.  
_

_The moment their hands touched, both swore to god that they felt electricity._


	5. The meetup.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which they are boring-ass teachers with a boring-ass relationship. In which they are supposed to be history, but then it didn’t look like it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Alice: Here you go, after five chapters of depressing sadness, we decided to actually show some fluff side from the flashbacks. I give you my love. As always, ᕕ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)ᕗ
> 
> Sofie: as Alice said, here is some fluff for ya. Also this chapter is pretty long compared to the other, but that’s just good! enjoy! B)
> 
> (originally posted by [constipatedhowell](http://constipatedhowell.tumblr.com) and [athletichowell](http://athletichowell.tumblr.com) from tumblr)

You could say Phil was overreacting; after all, it was just three minutes since he has arrived.

He sighed and shifted on his seat; he doesn’t even know why did Dan suddenly wrote him a note. It could’ve been someone else, but Phil knew that Shakeaway was his favourite place to meet.

He stared at the window of the shop which was slightly foggy due to it’s cold temperature.

Five minutes.

_He’s not coming._

The man already felt it in his gut, that stupid, uncomfortable bullshit emotion where it takes all of your hopes away.

It’s _Dan_. He wants to trust him again, at least.

Eight minutes.

Maybe playing a little bit of Crossy Road won’t hurt. He smiled to himself as the familiar startup screen of the chicken greeted him.

He’s always found this game adorable in some way, especially if he uses the capybara.

Ten minutes.

There’s no hope, Dan’s nowhere near the mall and he’s just being a dick to Phil.

‘Just another ten minutes.’ He decided, even though the gut feeling is so annoying.

He gazed around him and observed the customers present.

There was a couple who laugh loudly and took a couple of pictures every now and then, and there’s also a pair of best friends who were giggling as they discussed Doctor Who.

Thirteen minutes.

_[Does your husband know the way that, the sunshine gleams from your wedding band?]_

Patrick Stump’s voice is doing little help to soothe his nerves.

_What if Dan didn’t really come?_

Fifteen minutes.

He has probably remembered the whole number of lights inside the shop.

Seventeen minutes.

If only he had Dan’s number, Phil could have asked Dan if he was going or not.

But guess what, _he doesn’t._

He doesn’t even know why he did this; maybe you could say he was finally getting his head around the project. Then afterwards he’ll forget Phil.

Nineteen minutes.

Phil realises that he can’t forget Dan.

Twenty-one minutes.

_Okay then._

He stood up from his seat with a heavy sigh, a scowl easily present on his face.

‘Dan is just being a douche.’ He concluded and opened the door of the shop, feeling another kind of cool air hitting his cheeks.

Now that he’s still in the mall, a short time shopping for shirts won’t hurt.

He turned to his left and glanced a short bit to Shakeaway.

Dan could go fuck himself.

Phil opened his wallet to check if he has enough money to spend for a shirt (that was supposedly meant to be used on buying milkshakes). He smiled contently to himself when he saw that he has.

He was just about to put his wallet back to his pocket when he felt an arm drag him back to shop. He glanced and _goddammit_ , it was Dan.

“Where were you?” Phil asked the anger slowly rising from his voice as he retracted his arm.

“Sorry.” Dan apologised softly.

_He could pass any actor on such skills of acting._

“There was traffic on my way here.” He added and showed Phil a picture that looked like it was taken from inside a cab.

Phil didn’t answer, and they walked into Shakeaway and ordered their shakes in silence.

It was when they sat down again when Phil spoke up.

“I was just about to leave.” Phil frustratingly muttered as they sat down, well _again_ for Phil.

“Did I make you wait too long?” Dan inquired, slightly feeling guilty that he was late to his own appointment. Not that Phil was much of importance, anyway.

“Hm, no, I mean, spending on a table alone for twenty minutes as you felt horrible since this morning doesn’t seem to bad does it?” Phil spat back sarcastically and Dan sighed in response

“Let’s just,” He scrunched his face as if he doesn’t want to say it. “Let’s just forget about fighting for now and actually enjoy this. It’s been a long time since I’ve been to Shakeaway with someone.”

Phil could have sworn that was the first time Dan smiled at him after six years, and he couldn’t help that maybe, just maybe, there’s a little bit of hope after all.  

* * *

A shiver went down Dan’s spine when the cold air hit his body as he stepped out from his apartment. He closed the door behind him, locked it and let the keys slip down his pocket.

His eyes scanned the clock in his phone and realised that he was late. He was, in fact, very late.

They were supposed to meet 20 minutes ago, and his already stressed out body also started to feel guilt as he started to power-walk towards the cab that patiently waited outside of his apartment. Luckily the mall was pretty close from where he lived, only 5 minutes by car. He was too lazy to walk there himself, so he had decided to order a cab. Besides, he didn’t want to be anymore late then he already was so it was worth spending a little money this time.

The cab driver greeted Dan as he threw the door open and sat down on the seat.

“Take me to the closest mall.” He said quickly, slightly out of breath as he automatically put his seatbelt on. “And try to get there as fast as possible please, I’m in a bit of a hurry.”

The cab driver nodded and drove off.

“Late for a date or something?” The driver laughed and Dan bit his lip to stop himself from correcting the man in a rather rude way. That was none of his business. Even though it wasn’t a date, Dan didn’t think that it was a rather polite thing to joke about.

But he guessed that the driver just tried to be funny. Sadly, he failed miserably.

“Uh, no.” Dan answered back as politely as he could. “It’s not a date.”

He slapped himself mentally when he saw the amused smile that spread over the driver’s face. That was a stupid thing to say if he wanted to _avoid_ the subject.

“Sure thing.” The man mocked.

Dan didn’t answer, but instead rolled his eyes at the statement and brought his phone up from his pocket to check the clock. 3.23 pm.

_Shit, he was late now._

He realised that he didn’t have any valid excuse for being late. He had forgot the time while he was watching TV, but he couldn’t say that because that would probably make Phil angry.

Instead, he decided that he would take a picture inside of the cab and blame traffic. That sounded believable.

His finger pressed the camera button down, and a click was heard when the phone captured the picture. He saw in the corner of his eye that the driver shot him a glance when he heard the click, but he ignored it. There was no need to explain himself for taking a simple photo.

Another minute passed, and the taxi driver drove over to one of the special taxi parking lots. He stopped and gestured that they were here.

Dan stepped out from the car and brought his wallet out from his jacket pocket. The man rolled his window down when Dan approached to pay him for the ride.

They exchanged quick “thank you”’s and Dan the last bit towards the entrance.

It was impossible to deny the excitement that he felt at this moment. He didn’t really want to admit to himself that he did feel this way, since he never thought that he would feel excitement over meeting Phil in private again.

Though there was a slight chance that Phil had left already, judging from how late Dan was. He knew that Phil never arrived late to anything and if he ever did, he usually had a very good excuse for it.

The same goes for Dan. It was very rare that he was late for things but this time he had just simply forgotten the time, which was pretty surprising because he had been preparing himself for this ever since he had left the note.

But there was no point in overthinking this whole situation. It was what it was, he all he could do was to wish that Phil hadn’t left just yet.

When he stepped inside the mall, he shot a glance to see if he could see Phil there. Just in that moment, Phil walks out from the shop. Some kind of mixture of relief and guilt washed over him as he started to jog discreetly towards him to stop him from leaving.

His movement made some people stare his way, and he cursed himself under his breath for putting himself in this situation.

After a few embarrassing moments, he was in reach of Phil. He reached out for Phil’s arm and dragged him towards the shop, not making an effort to explain that it was him and not some kidnapper who just grabbed him.

When Phil felt the touch, he turned around and ripped himself free from the grip.

“Where were you?” He sounded angry and the guilt rose in Dan again.

“Sorry.” Dan meant it. “There was traffic on my way here.”

He showed him the picture but Phil didn’t look so very convinced.

_So much for that excuse._

They walked into Shakeaway again and ordered shakes in silence.

“I was just about to leave.” Phil muttered as they sat down around a table with their shakes in their hands.

“Did I make you wait too long?” Dan inquired, the feeling of guilt still lingering in his chest. He calmed himself down with the conviction that this wasn’t so very important anyway.

“Hm, no, I mean, spending on a table alone for twenty minutes as you felt horrible since this morning doesn’t seem to bad does it?” Phil spat back sarcastically.

Wow, he really was angry over this.   
Dan sighed.

“Let’s just,” He scrunched his face and hesitated. It felt so _weird_ to say this and if he had the choice, he would avoid it. He took a deep breath and smiled. “Let’s just forget about fighting for now and actually enjoy this. It’s been a long time since I’ve been to Shakeaway with someone.”

Phil glared at him as he took a sip of his shake, the hard expression on his face softening into a surprised one.

“Yeah, okay.” The tone of his voice also softening.

Dan nodded and brought the shake up to his mouth, trying his hardest not to feel uncomfortable with this situation.   
“So,” He began and tasted his shake. “We really need to discuss this… problem, so to speak.”

Phil nodded in agreement.

“Yeah.” Phil answered, making little to no effort to bring the conversation further. This angered Dan. Wasn’t fixing things between them what he wanted?  
“Lester.” Dan warned and tried to hold back the growing annoyance. “You know we are here to fix things, right? You can’t just act like you don’t care because there is no other way we can get out of this mess.”

Phil let out a long drawn sigh and slightly shook his milkshake.

“Yes I know. It just feels like you are only doing this to make things easier for you, and not for both you and me. Like you don’t give a shit about how I feel.” Phil looked up at Dan and gave him this sad look that always managed to annoy him.

Dan clenched his teeth. He didn’t really know what to think about that statement.

Maybe Phil was right, maybe he was only doing this for his own sake.  He hadn’t even thought about how Phil might be feeling about this, and that’s maybe something he should start doing since they were both stuck with this project that no one of them wanted.

“Of course I care about how you feel, just help me out here, okay?” He said through his clenched teeth and rubbed his forehead.   
  
Phil gave him this _‘yeah whatever you say’_ look but then cleared his throat.

“Like, the only solution to this is if you stop being so stubborn and just try to communicate with me even if it feels wrong. I can understand if you think it feels weird and stuff because of what we… had. But I’m afraid it’s the only way.” Phil said, slightly hesitating when he trailed onto bringing the past up.

Dan groaned silently to himself.

Phil was right, it was the only way. It was his own pride that made it all problematic for them. He started to feel troubled. He didn’t want this to happen, he just _didn’t want to confront his past._ Was it really so hard to escape?

It seemed like it, and it really troubled him.

“Myeah.” He mumbled. “I know it’s my fault, it’s just that…” He stopped himself, realising that he was on his way to confess the reason why, and that was dangerous waters.

If he wanted to avoid making things awkward, this wasn’t the right thing to do.

“Just what?” Phil curiously asked. It sounded like he was on his way figuring everything out, which he was. But he wasn’t going to know.

“Nothing, never mind.” Dan said harshly, showing that he really didn’t want to tell him.

Phil seemed taken aback by the sudden change in Dan’s tone.

“Oh okay.”

The volume in the shop started to rise with the increasing customers entering the store, and Dan felt like it was hard to think in here now. Besides, he was getting really uncomfortable with the small space and he felt like he needed to breathe.   
“Hey Phil, let’s take this somewhere else. It’s getting packed in here.” He suggested and when Phil nodded they both got up and left the store.

“Where should we go?” Phil asked when they left the shop.   
Dan’s eyes travelled around the mall, fixating on an arcade.

“Let’s go over there.” He pointed and Phil nodded.

* * *

Dan could say that he liked Phil a little bit more after this thing they had this afternoon.

They went to the arcade, ate some fish and chips and managed to shop for some books, and it felt like the atmosphere around them seemed to ease up to his relief.

Phil just felt the same as well, it was like reliving their old days. Except there was no kissing or hugging, in which he prefers to relive than most of these.

They were walking down the familiar road of his flat, which felt funny since he was walking Dan home.

“And then I was like, ‘Let me throw the other shoe for you! ” Dan laughed next to him as he told Phil the story of how his college mate lost his rubber shoes, to which Phil giggled at.

“You seem to have a good college experience.” He complimented as they took a turn home.

“No way.” Dan disagreed. “I had this roommate named Chris and he always makes out with his boyfriend PJ in our room. It was horrible.”

Phil didn’t say anything back, but smiled still.

They passed his apartment complex until he saw that Dan wasn’t walking with him anymore.

“What’s wrong?” He asked as he jogged back to the other as he looked confused.

“You’re going too far; I just live here.” Dan answered with the shake of his head.

Probably minutes since he had looked like it, Phil was gaping at him. “Are you serious?”

“What? What’s wrong?”

“I live here too!” Phil answered, flailing his arms for a short bit as to add emphasis.

“You’re kidding me.” Dan refused to believe him. “You’re actually kidding me.”

“No I’m not!” Phil frowned, a little hurt that Dan won’t take his word.

“How come I’ve never seen you here before?”

“Well, I’m mostly early compared to someone-”

“Okay, fine you’ve made your point.”

Then Phil stared at him, as if it’s his first time gazing into his brown orbs.

“Tomorrow?” Dan questioned, breaking the silence.

“Yeah.” Phil beamed at him.

“Listen, Dan, about our relationship-”

“I’m not an idiot Phil. I guess I was pretty blind a few days ago but I think we could still be friends.”

Phil’s felt his heart thump. Did he just-

“Are you serious?” He could feel the tears welling up in his eyes. He lunged into Dan, catching him in a hug. “Thank you.”

And Dan knew this was coming, he was still Phil he once had.

“Oh- sorry!” Phil immediately pulled away with a stutter. He fucked up again-

“No.” The brunet shook his head and smiled warmly and opened his arms. “Come here.”

Now Phil could actually feel tears on his cheeks. He charged to Dan again for another hug and inhaled his scent. May this hug be platonic or not, he _absolutely_ missed this.

“Hey, hey. It’s okay.” Dan whisper as he wiped his tears.

“Sorry, I got carried away.” Phil laughed.

“I’d say goodbye to any other person, but since you live here, I guess see you around.” Dan chuckled.

Phil hugged him again, this time much tighter than before. “I’m really thankful Dan. I know you still haven’t forgiven me, but I’m glad you thought about giving me another chance; on being a friend at least.”

“You’re welcome.” Dan smiled one last time before he bid ‘see you around’ and started to walk the other direction Phil’s flat was at.

Maybe he wasn’t overreacting after all.

* * *

Dan sighed as he fell down in his sofa.

That meeting took an unexpected turn, didn’t it?

He still couldn’t believe how open he had been towards Phil. He had been enjoying his company, laughing with him and _actually invited him to hug him_.

He never thought that he would ever let him touch him again. Sure, the touch did feel a bit strange but he felt like it was a necessary thing to do.

Hope started to grow in his stomach when he thought about how comfortable he had felt when they had walked home.

Maybe this would work. Maybe they could play this off as friends.

* * *

_“Can I kiss you?” Phil inquired as he leaned on Dan’s shoulder; they were having a date. Rather their first date._

_“Phil, you’ve kissed me before.” Dan giggled. “Why are you asking for my permission just now?”_

_“I don’t know, it’s our first date I guess.”_

_“Come here, you turnip.” Phil shot his head up and caught his lips in a sweet kiss that tasted like chocolate due to the milkshakes they were drinking._

 


	6. Locked away

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which they are boring-ass teachers with a boring-ass relationship. In which they are supposed to be history, but then it didn’t look like it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Alice: idk but ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°) i think it’s obvious that i use the lenny face 24/7 now. it’s a fantastic meme come on. anyways, i hope you enjoy the new chapter of patrick- i meant fos. we did not scream in capslock in five pages for nothing.  
> Sofie: sat dan (pls dont listen to sofie- alice xx). she’s probably right i’m a mystery. anyway, i hope you enjoy our chapter, we are very proud of patri- i mean fos. (✿◠‿◠)
> 
> (originally posted by [constipatedhowell](http://constipatedhowell.tumblr.com) and [athletichowell](http://athletichowell.tumblr.com) from tumblr)

This morning it was different.

The students noticed right away when the two teachers stepped inside the classroom the morning after, with smiles glued on both of their face, that something had changed between them. The atmosphere was far from as tense than it usually was and no death glares was exchanged between them.

When Dan spoke up to greet the class, he didn’t sound angry nor bothered. Instead, it was replaced with a genuinely happy and cheerful voice and that was when the whispering between the students began.

Notes were discreetly passed around out of sight from the two men and many different speculations were brought up.

Maybe they were broken up before the project started and got back together yesterday?

Maybe an unresolved argument between them were cleared up this morning?

Maybe they just took advice from the girl who called them out yesterday and just pretended to be happy?

Or maybe they just reached the point of insanity.

No one knew, except for Dan and Phil, but that didn’t stop people from discussing and speculating of course. That was what’s so fun with the whole relationship idea. All the questions and the mystery around it.

It wouldn’t have been as fun if they just plain out explained what was going on between them and didn’t let the students try figure things out. It was some kind of mixture between wanting to solve the mystery themselves and the wanting for an explanation that made the whole idea of a romantic relationship between them so exciting.

To anyone who isn’t involved in this, it would probably seem like a very strange thing to be excited over and it didn’t make it easier trying to explain it.

It was nice little inside joke that the school had going and it made it exciting to go to school everyday. There was now nobody on the school who didn’t know about the current happenings and these good news would spread like wildfire.

As the lesson went on, the students got more and more convinced that they didn’t play it off like they was friends, but actually genuinely was more comfortable around each other.

The youngsters bodies itched from excitement and they just wanted the lesson to end so they could tell their friends.

When the lesson finally ended they eagerly bursted out from the classroom, ready to spread the words that weighed their chest.

It wasn’t only the students who noticed the sudden change this morning. When the two teachers entered the teacher’s lounge laughing together, that they caught everyone inside’s attention.

The teachers, who knew them even better then the students did, exchange confused glances with each other and when Gilbert saw this he huffed out an amused laugh.

“Told you so.” He chuckled to the people who sat closest to him and raised his coffee mug towards them to show how he proud he was over his brilliant idea of pairing them together.

They should all thank him, after all.

* * *

“I told you, I placed it on my desk this morning!”

The class’ ears perk up at the sudden voice of Phil Lester whined in their ears.

“If you placed it, why was it gone?” Dan Howell snapped back.

Okay so maybe they aren’t getting along.

“I swear to god Philip, you’re such a messy person.” Dan added as he sat down on his chair.

“Excuse me,” Phil grumbled back as he walked to the chalkboard and start writing today’s agenda. “I am not.”

“You can’t just expect someone to clean up a mess or pick up something you had lost, for god’s sake.”

“I am telling you Dan, I know I left it there.”

“No matter what you say, it’s not helping until it magically reappears again.”

The class burst into a fit of giggles at their teachers’ antics. They looked so domestic with this argument.

“Mr. Howell.” A boy called, a sly grin on his face.

“What?” Dan accidentally answered in an angry manner (mostly because of Phil).

“You never told us that you and Mr. Lester got married.” The boy, who Dan remembered was named as Alfred, snickered, the class collectively laughing.

Phil might have or might not have dropped the chalk he was holding.

“What?” Him and Dan both asked, their voice low.

Even with the obvious hint of annoyance to their faces, Alfred bothered to continue his teasing. “You look like a married couple; especially you Mr. Howell, you seem to talk to Mr. Lester as if he’s your husband and he’s giving you troubles cleaning the house.”

Dan rolled his eyes. Why were children like this  _born_? “Jones, if you won’t shut up in this moment, I won’t hesitate on holding you for detention.”

But Phil shook his head. “Let it go Dan. I’m sure Alfred would keep his mouth shut after this.”

Alfred saw him smile a little too friendly, as if inviting him to speak again. So he didn’t.

Rather, he passed a note to his mates, contrary it being girls who pass notes in class.

His group of friends laughed quietly, gaining a short bit of Dan’s attention but soon left when Phil bumped on the desk, almost knocking out the materials placed near the edge.

“Oh my god, Phil.” Dan exclaimed, burying his hands on his face as he dragged the ‘i’ on his, well,  _friend’s_ , name. He looked at him again, his eyes full of somewhat pity. “Would you believe what I said earlier now?”

Phil pouted slightly and looked like he was going to retaliate something back yet the students of the class already spoke for him.

“You should really believe your husband sir”

“Mr. Lester, you should listen to  _Mr. Lester_ ”

“Here we see the continuation of the domestic argument of the Lester couple”

But before they had the chance to rip their heads off the bell rang and the  _children_ streamed out of the class, as if they planned on doing this from the start.

“I can’t believe this.” Phil groaned with a shake of his head.

“So do I.” Dan agreed as he helped arrange the papers scattered by Phil when he bumped on the desk.

“Yeah.” Phil smiled at him and placed the now neatly ordered papers back to its destinated drawer. “Say Dan, can we discuss about something?” He added the question quietly, as if he’s scared of what will Dan say.

“Sure, but I’m guessing that it’s about..” He gestured to the empty seats in front of them.

Phil laughed softly. “Yeah, about that…”

* * *

“Say Dan, can we discuss about something?”

Dan knew that question was coming. There was no doubt that the teasing had become a really big thing now. There wouldn’t be one lesson where the students didn’t mock them for being together or something like that.

Even though he knew what it was all about, he wanted to ask about it so it would get awkward.

“Sure, but I’m guessing that it’s about…” He gestured to the empty seats in front of them. He didn’t have to complete the sentence for Phil to understand what he wanted to say and Phil laughed.

“Yeah, about that…”

Dan weighed against the desk and turned to face Phil. He sighed and his hand ran through his fringe, leaving it slightly messy.

When Phil put away the last bundle of papers he faced Dan as well and their eyes met for a second but Dan broke the contact as fast as he could, looking down on the desk instead.

He heard Phil sigh and clear his throat.

“How do you feel about all this?” It sounded like he trembled a bit. “I mean all the teasing, like… calling you Mr. Lester and stuff?”

Dan glanced up towards Phil again and snorted.   
“What do you think?” Dan spat back and he answer came out a little more harsh than he expected it to. An unknown expression flickered in Phil’s eyes.

“I don’t like it either. What do you think we should do about it?”

“Well…” Dan sighed. “We could try to tell them to stop, but I doubt that will have any effect at all since the whole god damn school is involved with this, as well as the fucking teachers.”

Phil nodded in agreement and seemed to lost in thoughts. Silence fell over them and Dan groaned loudly in response to the lack of communication. He pushed himself away from the desk with the help of his hand and started to pace back and forth.

He didn’t know how he would be able to cope with this. The warning the voice in his head told him before he wrote that note was right, the idea _would_  just bring more fuel to this bullshit.

How could he not have seen this coming? It was so incredibly obvious and he cursed himself for not understanding it.

“Are you okay?” Phil broke the silence, looking worried. “We don’t have to talk about this now if you don’t want to.”

Dan shook his head in frustration and continued to pace.

“We can’t talk about this later, if we want it to stop, something needs to be done now!” He started to get worked up now, on the verge of panicking.

“Dan, calm down. I’m sure that if we t-”

“They won’t listen!” Dan hissed and stopped in his tracks. “I promise you, they won’t! They will just see it as another reason to continue teasing us! I don’t think I…”

He shook his head as he trailed off and started to pace again, his breathing increasing.

“Why are you so panicky about it?” Phil ran his hand through his hair, seeming frustrated and unsure about what to do in this situation. “They are just doing it for fun, they like the idea about us together, so what? Can’t we just ignore it?”

“I can’t ignore it!” Dan shouted, and when he saw the shocked expression on Phil’s face, guilt washed over him. He stopped pacing and sat down on behind a student’s bench. He buried his face in his hands and sighed.

“I’m sorry Phil, I just…” He panted, trying to calm down. “I just want them to see us as _friends_ , you know?”

“It’s okay, I understand.” Phil assured.

Dan nodded argued with himself whether or not he should tell Phil why. It felt mean to leave him hanging, not knowing why he just lost his cool over it.

But no, he couldn’t tell. Not right now, at least. He looked up at Phil and gave him a sad smile.

“The whole Mr. Lester thing, it’s far from happening, right?”

Phil blinked at the question and gulped.

“Yeah.”

Dan ran his hand through his fringe, correcting it since it was slightly hanging down in his eyes from the previous situation.

“Sweet.”

* * *

Confusion.

That, as an English teacher, is the first emotion Phil had thought when he went home. Or at least that’s how his inner dictionary described it.

Maybe a tinge of guilt.

_Ha._

Okay, a big part of guilt.

But he wasn’t the one to blame, right?

Phil is just being stupid.

Of course he’s to blame, he’ the one who started all of this after all.

_If only you didn’t mock him on the first day._

He could say he just craved Dan’s attention, then. Since they’ve met on the summer meetings of the school, he had always wanted Dan to talk to him.

Sure, he can talk to him now, Friends, as per say. But really Phil? Are you really down for what he said?

The sentence looped around his head, just like how a broken record would be.

_[The whole Mr. Lester thing, it’s far from happening, right?]_

He wants bang his head on the wall repeatedly as he heard Dan’s voice say that ten-word sentence again and again that flowed through his ears despite the fact that: a) It happened a while ago, b) It’s impossible for Dan to be here.

So Phil had just to face it; he’s got no chance on Dan.

There you have it, the source of his sadness.

He still _wants_  it; Dan’s  _attention._

The attention that cares for him, giving him late night kisses and protective hugs. Smiles that lights up his day even when it’s night. Hands that warms him through frozen winters.

But it’s long gone, pity.

He’s an adult who’s stuck in his teenage phase- no. Dan’s _not_  a phase, and he’ll  _never_  be.

Phil knew he still had those feelings locked up away somewhere in his chest and  _oh shit_ , it’s bursting any day soon.

He hung his head low on his fridge when he took out his milk for a cup of tea as he realised what he had just thought.

It’s bursting any day  _soon._

He wouldn’t want that; Phil just got Dan’s trust the other day, he can’t just go up to Dan and be like ‘Hey bear, I still love you so won’t you give your lion a big hug and kiss me all better.’. For fuck’s sake.

All of these emotions are  _obviously_  bullshit.

Like he had concluded, confusion.

Yes, he’s just…confused.

He doesn’t love Dan anymore, he’s gotten over him.

He told Dan this afternoon an answer that pretty much reflects his ironic butterflies in his tummy.

Yes, Dan? Over.

Tomorrow he’ll face Dan, up and tall with a kind smile.

He’ll stop thinking about getting him back, because Dan made it clear that he doesn’t want to be with Phil anymore.

Phil swore he saw the sadness, the hurt behind his hazel-brown eyes as he raised the question to him. And it made him choke on a dry sob.

Dan doesn’t love him, those emotions are already gone.

Yeah, so Phil’s got to respect that. He’s got to forget his own feelings too, just for Dan.

So he decided that to finally lock those emotions, making sure it’s sealed in his chest.

For that’s what you have to do for someone you love.

* * *

_“Phil?” Dan nudged him on the arm, nervously looking down on his feet when Phil turned around at the touch._

_“What is it?” Phil noticed his unusual body language and chuckled. “Is there something on your mind?”_

_“I have something to confess.” A faint blush dusted Dan’s cheeks as he met Phil’s gaze._

_“What?”_

_Dan took a deep breath and huffed out a nervous laugh._

_“I think I’m in love with you.”_


	7. Doubt it

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which they are boring-ass teachers with a boring-ass relationship. In which they are supposed to be history, but then it didn’t look like it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Alice: Feeling ( ͡° ʖ̯ ͡°) bc we bring forth sad news. FOS might not be updated for a few days bc sof is going to london. im sor ry. i hope the daily updates we had are enough to suffice a short term break. we’ll try to update though, dw !!  
> Sofie: as Alice said, i’m going away this weekend but worry not (if ur actually worried), we will update it as soon as we can, anyway enjoy this chapter (◕‿◕✿) 
> 
> (originally posted by [constipatedhowell](http://constipatedhowell.tumblr.com) and [athletichowell](http://athletichowell.tumblr.com) from tumblr)

“Phil, can you wait for a bit?” Dan asked as he stood up from the seat across Phil. They were at the cafeteria drinking coffee in the early morning.

“Yeah, sure.” Phil weakly smiled at him and watched his figure stand on the snacks’ line. He returned his gaze at the his coffee and swirled the liquid with his spoon.

Weird, they were just like this six years ago.

* * *

_“Babe, wait for me a bit, will you?” Dan asked as he stood up from the seat across Phil. They were having a short, after school date at Starbucks._

_“Yeah, sure.” Phil beamed at him and watched his figure stand on the order line. He returned to his gaze at his drink and sipped it slowly._

_He could live like this, every minute of his life spent with Dan._

_“Backstreet’s back.” He heard Dan’s voice behind him. “Let’s go?”_

_“Alright!” Phil giggled as he stood up as well. “Okay.”_

_He slotted his hand to Dan’s and smiled as they walked out of the shop, drinks in hand._

_“Oh come here you nerd.” The brunet chuckled as he reached to Phil and pecked him softly on the lips._

_“My drink’s going to spill.” Phil whined as Dan kept on kissing him (yet he returned them anyway). “Daaaaan.”_

_“Sorry.” Dan giggled again. “Can I come over and stay do the night in your house? I mean I don’t know if it’s your okay with your mum and dad but…”_

_“Hm.” Phil wondered for a bit. Maybe he can; all he could do is just hope that his parents didn’t… “Yeah, of course you can. My door is always open for you.”_

_“Just like your jeans then?”_

_Phil spluttered and hastily zipped up the fly of his jeans before leaning down to give his boyfriend a chaste kiss. “Thanks.”_

_“You’re welcome.” Dan’s voice sounded like honey._

_“But seriously? My jeans are always open for you.”_

_Phil received a nudge in his side and laughed again._

_Yes, he could definitely live with this._

_“Do you think we have time to stop by my house? I’m going to grab a couple of clothes.” Phil watched him sway their hands together and sipped on his drink._

_“You can always borrow my clothes you know.” He suggested. “But I’m sure you’re not going to be wearing clothes the whole night.” He added with a sly wink._

_“Philip Lester!” Dan erupted from laughter as he mocked Phil’s mother’s voice._

_“Sorry mum.” Phil jokingly answered before letting go of Dan’s hand to throw his now empty drink._

_“I love you.” He said gently as he took Dan’s hand again._

_“I know.”_

_“Dan, this is not Star Wars-”_

_“I love you too.”_

_Then Phil smiled._

_They reached the front door of Phil’s house laughing about how their classmate Louise managed to knock over Tyler in Science class. The paler swung the door open and a pair of fake-tanned arms was all over him._

_“Philly-baby! I missed you so much!” An annoying, high-pitched voice rang in Dan’s ears as he watched the girl smother his **boyfriend’s**  cheeks with disgusting kisses._

_“Raine!” Phil gasped as he tried to break away from the girl’s grasp. “What are you doing here?”_

_“Your parents invited me for dinner!” She exclaimed and attempted to kiss Phil again but Dan finally blocked her way._

_“Uhh, excuse me, but you are kissing the wrong person.” He said with a low voice._

_“Philly-baby, who’s this?” She said, an **ugly**  pout being formed by her mouth._

_“He’s…” Shit. “He’s my **friend**.” Phil lied in a quick breath._

_“What?” Dan’s eyes widened and he felt fury rushing in his veins._

_“Well excuse me, Philly’s **friend** , I still have to give my fiance my ‘welcome home’ kiss.” She giggled. “You know, practice for the future.”_

_“Fiance?” Dan didn’t even sound alive. He sounded like a ghost and ran. Ran outside, away from Phil’s house. He can’t help it, tears were streaming down in his cheeks._

_“Oh, he left.” Raine uttered in a surprised tone and grabbed his arm. “Baby I think you should come inside, your parents are-”_

_“You know what? You guys can go fuck yourselves.” Phil sneered and ran after Dan, who was running toward the neighbourhood’s park._

_“Dan!” He called as he tried to catch up to him, which was pretty easy for Dan was never the runner to begin with._

_“Fuck off Phil.” He scowled and attempted to run farther but Phil pulled his arm. “I said fuck off. Go enjoy your weekend with Ms. Fake-Tan McBitch, I bet it’ll be fun.”_

_“Dan let me explain!” Phil cried as Dan struggled in his hold. But no, he’s not letting him go._

_“There’s nothing to explain Phil! You are engaged!”_

_“I love you.”_

_But Dan just chuckled humorlessly. “I bet you’ll say that at the altar when you marry her.”_

_“Believe me Dan, I **never**  wanted this! I never said yes to the idea of my engagement!”_

_“Why didn’t say it to me any sooner? Instead of letting me know through this bullshit?” The coal-haired boy saw tears stain his **boyfriend’s**  naturally tanned cheeks._

_“I’m sorry, I was so scared and I-” Phil loosened his grip accidentally and Dan retrieved it from him before he had the chance to grab it back._

_“Phil, I love you, I love you so, so, **so** , much. But if this is the case, you cheated on me.” There were tears streaming on his own face and Phil could only sniff. Dan reached a hand and wiped his tears. “As much as I hate to say this, but it’s over, love.”_

_He placed a soft kiss on Phil’s lips one last time and mumbled an ‘I love you’ before running away._

_Phil didn’t know why, but his legs never ran after the one he **loves.**_

_But he did know one thing;_

_It’s that he **never**  smiled again._

* * *

“I have returned.” Dan said in a clear voice as he threw the chocolate bar on the table.

Phil snapped out of his trance when the sound of the chocolate bar landing reached his ears.

He drew a breath when he saw that it was Dan that had returned and the brunet tilted his head.

“Are you okay?”

Phil realised how frustrated and sad his facial expression probably was and he shook his head.

“Yeah, I just…” He gulped. “I just need to go to the bathroom quickly?” The sentence came out more as a question than a statement, and Dan just nodded in confusion.

“Alright.”

Phil nodded back, stood up from the table and walked quickly towards the closest bathroom. He got a several glances towards him but he didn’t care, he just looked down on his feet, focusing on not crying.

His hand pushed the bathroom door open hard and made himself jump from the loud sound it made when the door hit the wall. He bit his lip and closed the door carefully, making sure that he didn’t draw anymore attention to him than he had already done.

As soon as he had closed the door, he gripped the sink and weighed towards it.   
A frustrated groan escaped his lips as he looked at his reflection in the mirror. He just couldn’t believe himself.

He was still getting worked up over the memory. In fact, he was still getting worked up over  _all_ of the god damn memories.

It had been so long since it all happened. Why are they still lingering in his mind, attacking him when he least expects it?

He didn’t know why they kept returning, the only thing he knew is that it hurt him. A lot.

His hand ran through his hair and he shut his eyes hard as the tears started to make their way down his cheeks. He regretted that afternoon so much.

If he had one wish, he would wish that he could wind the time back so he could tell that girl that Dan was his boyfriend.

He would, in fact, scream it at her face. He would scream it at his parents’ faces as well, making them realise that he didn’t want any forced relationship.

He would have stopped it before it all went out of hand. It could’ve saved his and Dan’s relationship and it would have saved him from the horrible thing he considered doing to himself.

That horrible thing that made his parents cancel the marriage. The worst thing about it is that it could have ended Phil as well.

He had to take deep breaths to stop the ugly sobs from coming out loud and perfectly hearable to anyone who walked past. But it was hard since he had been keeping this inside of him for so long, and everything that he had built up inside of him was now bursting.

The memories were destroying him from the inside. He had always lived with the hope that one day they wouldn’t hurt as much, and that they would turn into one of those memories that you looked back on and shrugged at, realising that it’s no big deal anymore.

But no, that looked like something that was impossible.

It was the complete opposite, it was getting worse.

After he had managed to calm himself down he angrily wiped the tears away. As if crying over memories including your friend that you were head over heals in love with wasn’t bad enough, to do it at a _school toilet_  while he was sitting out there waiting for you to return was even worse.

He took a deep breath and looked at his reflection, only to find himself in a horrible state. His nose were read and eyes swollen from the minor breakdown he just had.

His hands let go of the sink and turned the water on, trying to wash away the redness in his face with cold water. Perhaps that could help him with somewhat returning to reality again.

To his relief, it helped and his face was returning to it’s normal state again. He wiped his face off as well as he could and decided to return to Dan.

He slowly opened the door again and walked out from the bathroom discreetly, his face as neutral as he could manage.

When he returned to the cafeteria and met Dan’s eyes again, his stomach felt like it turned around.

“Let’s go?” The tanned man inquired as soon as he saw Phil returning.

“Yeah.” The other barely managed to answer without his voice cracking.

There was no way he would get over this anytime soon.

* * *

Dan glanced on his phone clock, starting to wonder where the hell did Phil go.

He had been away for 8 minutes and that’s not really a normal length for a simple toilet break when you are having a friend waiting for you.

But something in the back of his head couldn’t help but worry for him. Maybe something happened when he was away getting a snack? Phil did look pretty upset when Dan came back after all.

For a second he considered going after him to see if everything was okay, but smacked himself mentally when he realised what was going through his head.

Was he actually sitting here worrying for Phil Lester when he was away for a toilet break? It was so stupid, he couldn’t help but laugh at himself.

Though he couldn’t help but feel relieved when his eyes locked with Phil’s when he finally returned.

“Let’s go?” He inquired and got up from where he sat, collecting his mug and the leftover chocolate wrapper..

“Yeah.” Phil answered back, his voice cracking. He immediately cleared his throat afterwards and gave Dan an apologising look.

Dan nodded and they walked back to the teacher’s lounge together.

He couldn’t help but send glances at Phil, studying his behavior. He walked with his head down and there was no doubt that he was sad, but Dan had no clue why.

The worrying feeling returned and again he felt confused. Since when did he feel any sympathy towards this man?

He clenched his teeth and resisted the urge to tug at his hair. This was not supposed to happen. He didn’t expect to actually start to sympathize and feel things for him as a friend.

Finally, they arrived at their destination and Dan pushed the door open for him.

Phil smiled tepidly when he walked inside.

“Thanks.” His voice seemed to break again and he quickly turned around like he was afraid of the way Dan would react to it.

Dan drew a breath. One part of him wanted to ask Phi. what was bothering him, but another part of him told him not to. It told him that he didn’t owe Phil anything after what he had done against him. That something was seriously wrong with him actually feeling bad for him.

He realised that the bad part of him was right and he shook the feeling off of him.

“See you later, then.” He said and they parted ways.

He’s so fucked up.

* * *

_“I think I’m in love with you.” He heard Dan mutter under his breath. Then he shuffled his feet and glanced at him expectantly._

_“I- uh.” And of course, Phil was at lost for words. Then he inwardly grinned. “I’m sorry, Dan.”_

_He saw him shoot his head up. A face that made him turn all goo and want to hug all the the hurt he had caused._

_“I’m sorry but I,” The paler paused, pulling a sad expression. “I’m in love with you too.”_

_He could have sworn the clock on the wall stopped ticking, because Dan’s lips were on him._

_“Phil you sappy bastard.” Dan mumbled against his chest as Phil pulled him in a tight hug. “You never know how much I wanted to do that.”_

_This day is perfect._


	8. Still

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which they are boring-ass teachers with a boring-ass relationship. In which they are supposed to be history, but then it didn’t look like it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Alice: HI IM SO SORRY IF WE LEFT YOU HANGING FOR A WEEK. fuck timezones holy shit. pls forgive us. we are humble memes and we only wish to write gay stories. thank. as always, ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)>⌐■-■  
> Sofie: IT'S FINALLY UPDATED!! I stg our timezones hates each other. by the way, the song we mention in this chapter is called if it means a lot to you - a day to remember  
> the original song is with guitar, but if you search for a piano version you will get feels!! I'm so glad this chapter is finally done, enjoy!!  
> (ﾉ◕ヮ◕)ﾉ*:･ﾟ✧
> 
> **PS: TW CUTTING**    
> [ _**(listen to the piano song here ! -if you want to cry)** _ ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JFkDArYAkKw)
> 
> (originally posted by [constipatedhowell](http://constipatedhowell.tumblr.com) and [athletichowell](http://athletichowell.tumblr.com) from tumblr)

Dan’s finger danced over the piano keys, filling his apartment with the beautiful music that erupted everytime he pressed down a key. The tones they made mixed into a song that is too familiar to him.

He hummed along and closed his eyes, his fingers still knowing exactly where to go to continue the song without him looking. He had played this song so many times and even though he didn’t want to admit it, it gave him this feeling deep down in his stomach.

This was the exact song he used to play when he and Phil got in a fight when they were a ‘thing’, and when Phil sang along to it, it meant that he had forgiven Dan.

He wasn’t sure why he played this particular song, because the last thing he needed right now was to start to feel things.

As the song progressed and got more intense, the feeling in his stomach got worse. The only thing he could think about was Phil. This whole song screamed Phil and he tried to shake it off. But it didn’t help, the feeling just got more intense.

He shook his head in frustration and he decided to change song, but his fingers didn’t let him. They kept on playing the addictive tune and he couldn’t find himself to stop.

They kept on dancing like they had their own will and Dan felt like he was suffocating. He needed to stop playing, because this was taking him to places where he didn’t want to be. He didn’t want this to happen again.

A memory flashed before his eyes.

When they had been fighting over coming out in the beginning of their relationship, when he was really self-conscious over his sexuality. Phil had told his parents about his and Dan’s relationship and that made Dan really fed up. Phil just did it without Dan’s consent and the whole thing made him anxious and disappointed.

That was when he sat down in front of the piano and played this song to calm himself down. That was when Phil had been standing in the doorway and watched him play. He had been walking towards him and sat down behind Dan, resting his head on his shoulder and hummed along to it.

_“I’m so sorry, bear.”_

Dan snapped back from his daydreaming and realised what he was doing.

He was thinking back. He was feeling this feeling of nostalgia and this longing, aching feeling of missing _something_.

It overwhelmed him so much that he snapped out from the playing trance, and slammed the piano keys down with his both fists in frustration.

The music was abruptly replaced with the loud sound it made and Dan breathed heavily, resting his forehead against the clenched fist.

Why the hell did he think that _that_  was a good idea?

He could feel his shoulder burn where Phil had been resting his head in the memory and he was so close to screaming. But instead, he bit his lip hard and tugged at his hair aggressively. He felt sick from even looking at the piano and quickly stood up to walk away from it.

He didn’t care to put the lid back on even though he hated how dusty it got when he let it stay open, because of what just happened he just couldn’t touch it right now.

A loud groan escaped from his lips as he buried his face in his hands. This wasn’t good.

This wasn’t good at all.

It was just getting more and more confusing for every day that went pass. His thoughts were going haywire and the feelings in his stomach was wrestling with each other.

He didn’t understand what was going on. The frustration grew so big that he wanted to make a hole through the wall. This wasn’t supposed to happen, he was supposed to _forget_ his past, not _relive_ it.

It was so fucking _stupid_. Of course playing that song wouldn’t help, not when he was in this current sea of bewilderment.

He shook his head and tried to convince himself that this was just temporary. If he returned to his ordinary grumpy and defensive mindset, it would all return to normal soon.

* * *

Philip threw a crumpled paper across his bed.

_Fuck poems._

He stared at the pile of scratch papers next to him and couldn’t help but flinch at the messy handwriting written with blue ink.

There were so many of them; he didn’t even know he’s capable of doing these.

The clock on his bedside table hummed a tune, indicating that it’s midnight.

_Fuck the clock._

What happened?

Where did these poems come from?

All he could see was _his_ scribbles on each page, pouring out his every emotion.

You see, Phil hates cutting. He once tried it, with a brand new razor he got from the drugstore. He heard it feels great.

With a palpitating heart, he drag the sharp edge across his pale skin and yelped in pain.

_It doesn’t feel right._

The wound hurt. The burn seeping through his arm that repeatedly reminded him of how useless he was.

And how fucking stupid he is to do such thing that doesn’t help on bringing Dan back.

With eyes holding hot tears, he shook his head and washed his wrist. Then placed a band-aid to hide the cut.

And the razor was flushed down the toilet before he could cut any more.

So he relies on writing.

Poems mainly.

He just loves how he could note down his bursting emotions through words that can’t be made by actions.

He loved it. He loved it so much.

Because it felt like someone was listening to him.

Despite the fact that the only person who does that was Dan.

Who was gone.

Phil shivered at the memory and fought back the tears welling up his eyes.

_Not again._

He frustratingly grabbed a clean sheet of paper on the pile and started to write again. This time, it was accompanied by tear stains.

Every word, every stanza, it feels like a drug.

It feels like he could go on forever.

His pen could run out, he’ll just slash open a finger and use his blood as a substitute ink.

He could probably use the whole English dictionary, he still wouldn’t stop.

But then he just writes about the same thing.

Oh sorry, correction.

I meant, the same _person_.

Guess.

Of course it’s him.

_Of course it’s Dan-fucking-Howell._

He’s just the man worthy enough for Phil to spend endless nights with pouring his aching emotions through countless poems.

He doesn’t give a single shit if these letters wouldn’t bring his Dan back.

He just _needs_ release.

So he ended the poem and grabbed another clean sheet.

Wash, rinse, repeat.

* * *

 

“That’s it for today, have a nice weekend.”

The students stood up from their chairs and walked out from the classroom, a loud chatter started as soon as they were allowed to talk. Some of them nodded goodbye to Dan whilst he answered them back with a smile.

The classroom was very soon emptied and quiet, and the students’ obnoxious voices were no longer heard.

He fell back in his chair and rubbed his temple. This day had been pretty rough and he was really happy that it finally was over.

It had just been stress everywhere. Messy students and draining lessons with Phil for the project. He had been trying to stay away from him as much as he could today to avoid the risk of feeling...stuff.

Because of that _incident_.

A shiver went down his spine when he thought about it and he cursed himself for it. He wanted to forget that it had happened, and somehow prove to himself that it didn’t mean anything.

The urge of playing the song again grew strong and his fingers ached for it. He knew that it would be pretty risky but he couldn’t help himself.

He stood up and walked over to the only grand piano in the room and brushed his fingers over the keys. He bit his lip.

Was this really a good idea?

The chair made a loud screech when it was dragged across by him and his face formed into a frown from the noise as he sat down.

He really needed to do something about that.

His fingers trembled when he rested them against the keys just like the night before and he hesitated slightly.

What if it would be the same reaction this time?

No, he was prepared now.

This time, nothing would happen. This time he would play it and get no reaction from it, he would show himself that yesterday meant nothing.

It was just a sudden burst of weakness, everyone had those moment. But it wasn’t something that lasted.

He drew a deep breath and pressed the first key down. And then the second. Soon, the fingers moved by themselves again and he didn’t have to coordinate them.

The classroom got filled with the familiar song and everything felt fine so far. It wrapped Dan in a warm embrace and soothed him the way he wanted it too.

Not the way he felt yesterday, but the way you feel when you listen to your favourite song.

It sent a comfortable shiver through his entire body and he enjoyed every second of this. He was right. There was no single track of any other emotion than pure joy from how good the beautiful song was.

There was no Phil this time. No empty, longing feeling in his stomach.

Just happiness.

He smiled to himself and closed his eyes. He started to play louder and entire body moved along to how he played.

It was an amazing feeling, to get lost in the music. Every single doubt and worry he had in mind disappeared with the music, and the relief was a fact.

Suddenly, there was something wrong with the music. It had a weird tone to it that he swore wasn’t there before. It was almost like a hum.

He frowned in concentration as he intensely tried to figure out what was wrong. He kept playing and listened closely.

No, the source of the strange tone didn’t come from the piano. Maybe it was from the outside somewhere.

He let go of the keys and the music faded. It was when the strange tone didn’t disappear with the music that he realised.

His teeth clenched and he refused to look the way the humming came from. He knew it too well to know where it came from and who was responsible for it.

The humming continued, replacing the last bit of the song that Dan didn’t finish. The humming faded and silence fell over the room.

But Dan could still feel the presence of the person, and after a few moments he dared to turn around.

To his expectations, Phil was standing a few feet into the room with a weak smile was plastered over his face. He remembered and he wasn’t scared to show it.

Dan’s heartbeat increased and the air around him suddenly got extremely heavy. He didn’t know what to do with all those raging emotions, so they came out as anger; like they always did.

“Did I say you could come in? Did you even knock?” Dan snapped and his earlier scared and confused facial expression turned to a an angry one.

Phil’s smile faded and he seemed taken aback by the anger in Dan’s voice.

_What the hell did he expect then?_

This wasn’t something he could joke around with, and he should have enough common sense to understand that by now.

“No, you didn’t, but…” He began. “I just wanted to see if everything is okay? You have seemed a little distant towards me today.”

“Yes, everything is fine, _Phil_.” Dan said, trying to hint towards what Phil just did.

Everything is  _not_ fine.

Phil tilted his head, clearly not understanding what he did wrong.

Dan could feel the annoyance rise inside of him. How is it _possible_ to not understand why he just made him angered.

“Didn’t you realise what you just did?”

Phil opened his mouth to answer but then closed it again and sighed.

“I did, I’m sorry. I thought it might cheer you up?” He chuckled nervously.

“It doesn’t make me cheerful in any way! I don’t want to be reminded!” Dan shouted and pointed at the door. “Get out!”

The situation was starting to get uncomfortable. He didn’t want this to go any further, it was suffocating as it was already.

Phil didn’t leave, but a frown formed on his face and it seemed like what Dan had just said hurted him a lot. But Dan failed to feel sympathy with him, it was after all Phil that made Dan so extremely confused and frustrated.

The whole idea with playing the song was to show himself that he didn’t necessarily have to think about Phil everytime he played it, and it worked perfectly well until Phil came and almost made Dan relive the whole scenario that happened yesterday.

And this time, it wasn’t just an illusion.

“I don’t understand, why does it make you so angry?” Phil spoke up with slightly trembling voice, sounding frustrated

“Because,” Dan clenched his fist and groaned loudly. “Because I don’t want to relive the past! There is nothing between us anymore, okay? I don’t understand why you don’t get that fact straight to your head!”

Dan panted hard from being so upset.

Why couldn’t he just leave him be for 2 seconds so he could think?

He sighed angrily and ran his hand through his hair.

“We are just _friends_ Phil, don’t try to pretend something else. That thing you just did was extremely unnecessary.”   
Something unreadable flashed in Phil’s eyes and he gulped.

“I’m so sorry Dan, I really am.” His voice was almost a whisper and Dan felt like he wanted to punch the piano until it broke.

Instead, he just clenched his teeth.

“Why did you even do it in the first place?”

“I did it because I want you to be happy, because it does not seem like you are.”

Dan shook his head and snorted.

“Why do you care so much on how I feel in the first place?”   
Phil stood silent for a few seconds, met Dan’s eyes and took a deep breath.   
_“Because I still love you.”_

The words echoed quietly through the room and the silence that followed was deafening.

* * *

  _“Well it might be for the best.” Phil sang the last line for the chorus as Dan played the next chords leading to the second verse._

_The paler was about to sing the next line but halted when he saw the other’s non-moving fingers._

_“What’s wrong?” He asked. ‘Is he mad at me now?’_

_“I’m really sorry, Phil.” Phil heard him stifle a sob. “Please don’t leave me.”_


	9. Hate

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which they are boring-ass teachers with a boring-ass relationship. In which they are supposed to be history, but then it didn’t look like it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Alice: er uh, h i. it’s us again. wE HIT 666 hits earlier and then this had 2, 666 words so idk sof sold her soul probably. but ty omg for the 42 kudos. the next chapter, uh, brace yourself. as always, ヽ(͡◕ ͜ʖ ͡◕)ﾉ  
> Sofie: to be honest i’m not involved with the 666 incident, i actually think it’s alice who is a liar(she’s lying - alice xxx) NO IM NOT LYING okay sorry i hope we didn’t scare you, it’s fine there is no devil here(it’s sof only - al xxx) smfh  
> anyways, enjoy the chapter (✿◠‿◠)
> 
> (originally posted by [constipatedhowell](http://constipatedhowell.tumblr.com) and [athletichowell](http://athletichowell.tumblr.com) from tumblr)

_“Why do you care so much on how I feel in the first place?”_   
_Phil stood silent for a few seconds, met Dan’s eyes and took a deep breath._   
_“Because I still love you.”_

_The words echoed quietly through the room and the silence that followed was deafening._

* * *

Despite being an English teacher, the first word Phil could think of on what he had just described his actions with the most wonderful word.

Fuck.

He _wasn’t_ supposed to say that out loud.

“I’m so sorry Dan, that was a mistake; I-” The black-haired man tried to explain but he could see fury in Dan’s eyes. “Well it’s not exactly a mistake because it’s true but I mean- I wasn’t supposed to say it out loud and-”

“Get out.” Dan barely choked.

And despite wanting to go down on his knees and beg forgiveness to Dan, Phil thought it’s best to leave him alone.

He’s a fuck-up.

The best fuck-up, _probably_.

He triggered something Dan has been trying to keep low and all he could do is run?

Ha.

_What a fucking coward._

No wonder he left you.

You can’t even protect him over your parents.

You’re destroying him too.

You are a fuck-up, Philip.

It’s not like that four letter phrase wasn’t real, oh no.

It was legit and actually taken from somewhere inside Phil’s poor little heart which he repeatedly crushed whenever he cried for hours on some nights.

_You never learn a goddamn thing._

Stupid, worthless, unworthy.

Stupid because he gave Dan a fucking trigger.

Worthless because he’s no use.

_Who needs an English teacher who only does is write poems?_

And unworthy.

Unworthy of Dan’s love.

He doesn’t know why he’s still trying to get him back.

Dan made it fucking clear that he doesn’t want him at least a foot near him yet he still advances to him like the monster he is.

Yes.

That’s who Philip is.

_A monster._

* * *

 

Dan watched Phil leave the classroom, his heartbeat on a dangerously high rate.

His body was raging with emotions, but the strongest one was anger. He was furious, in fact.

_“Because I still love you.”_

The sentence played in his head repeatedly until the point where he was unsure if it all just was in his imagination.

But the smell of Phil’s cologne which still lingered in the air made it clear to him that everything did happen. He had just admitted to him that he _still_ loved him.

He tightened the clenched fists of his even harder. Why the hell would he say that?

Why would he play with him like that?

He wasn’t sure about that, but he was sure about something.

Phil had crossed the line. This wasn’t funny anymore.

Dan had been sure that this friendship thing would work out fine and that they would make it through the project without any problems; but it was like Phil wanted it all to collapse.

He was almost feeling genuine friendship towards him at this point but this just made him unsure and trembling again. It was almost like he felt betrayed.

Phil didn’t understand what Dan gave up to cooperate like this. He didn’t understand everything Dan had told himself, everything that Dan was trying to put behind him.

No, he sure as hell didn’t understand it.

Phil just entered the damn room, and told Dan that he still loved him.

Dan didn’t think that Phil understood the weight of those words.

That wasn’t something you fucked around with. Absolutely not in their case.

Dan was so angry that he didn’t know what he was going to do. The urge of throwing chairs around was extreme and he fought to make himself stay calm. He didn’t care if Phil heard his violent and angry panting, he almost wished that he did.

That Phil saw how big of an effect he could have on Dan.

It angered him even more to realise that he could change Dan’s mood so quickly. He shouldn’t care so much about what Phil told him, but he did.

Unfortunately, over the previous days it just grew bigger. He realised it just now.

_Great, another thing to be worried over._

He glanced over at the clock and saw that he was very soon allowed to quit for the day. He scoffed loudly when he thought about what the head teacher would say if he left now. At this point he didn’t give one single bit.

The paper’s on his desk was lying around like a mess as it usually did, and he collected them without caring if he ripped any of them apart.

He walked hastily through the corridor, not making eye contact or making an effort to greet anyone he met on the way. When he reached the teacher’s lounge he threw the door open with great force and it smashed into the desk behind it.

Everyone in the room, including Phil’s, threw shocked glances towards Dan because of the sudden loud interruption in their quiet atmosphere.

Dan found it hard to care less about how he had just scared the crap out of everyone in the room but just strolled to his cubicle, grabbed his stuff and left. He didn’t say goodbye to anyone, he just walked straight home.

* * *

 

Dan dreaded the next week.

But nevertheless monday came again like the _asshole_ it is and he’d to show up.

He didn’t want to confront Phil, and even less would he want to work together with him. The students would notice how tense it was between them and Dan groaned to himself when he thought about it.

God, the students are so incredibly annoying. They aren’t making the situation better by one bit.

He entered the teacher’s lounge. To his relief, Phil hadn’t arrived yet.

Though, Dan got a harsh glance from the head teacher who sat across the room. He just rolled his eyes and ignored it as he headed towards his workplace to fix stuff for the day.

“Dan.” The head teacher got up from his desk and walked after him. “Dan, do you have any good reason for leaving early last friday?”

Dan slammed his paper on the desk in front of him while he figured out something to say that sounded trustworthy.

“Well, I didn’t feel very good.”

That was probably as close to the truth he could come in this situation.

“You could’ve said something so I knew, instead of just leaving.” The head teacher said firmly and Dan resisted the urge to roll his eyes. It wouldn’t make things much better, would it.

“Yeah, sorry.”

The head teacher nodded and left.

That went smoother than he thought it would.

When Dan was finally done with getting his stuff ready for the upcoming lesson with Phil, Phil and Alex entered the room together. They were both laughing about something that Phil probably just had said.

“You are hilarious Phil.” Alex wiped his eyes dramatically. “Maybe we should meet up someday, whatcha think?”

Phil nodded towards him with a big smile across his face.

“Yeah sure Alex, anytime!”

“Here is my phone number.” Alex handed him a piece of paper and winked. “I’m free whenever you are.”

Dan felt a strange feeling in his stomach that reminded him of jealousy.

Was Alex flirting with _Phil_?

Phil attempted a sexy smile and winked back.

“I’m looking forward to it.”

Alex gave Phil a huge grin and walked out again. Dan didn’t realise that he was staring at Phil with a frown over his face until Phil met his gaze.

Phil gave him a weak smile and walked towards him.

“So uhm, I was t-”

“What the hell was _that_?” Dan snapped and interrupted Phil mid-sentence.

“What?” Phil looked confused at first, and then looked down at the piece of paper he held in his hand. “Oh, you mean that, with Alex?”   
“Yes, what else do you think I meant?” Dan growled.

“I don’t know, what happened last friday may-”

“Don’t bring that up again, it’s irrelevant.” Dan interrupted again with a warning tone. “Is there something between you and Alex?”

“No?” Phil shook his head and laughed. “Why are you so worked up?”

Dan didn’t know what to answer. To be honest, he didn’t understand why he was. It was none of his business and he clearly didn’t care at all.

But he couldn’t deny this feeling of jealousy. Phil shouldn’t be flirting with other people besides him.

He wanted to slap himself at that thought.

What the hell is happening to him?

Instead of telling the actual reason, he just frowned.   
“It’s just that, why would you date _Alex_ out of all the people?” He attempted a fake laugh to seem like he was amused, when he really wasn’t. At all.

“I’m not dating him?” Phil frowned as well. “I don’t understand why we are having this discussion, I thought you didn’t care anymore?”

“I don’t.” Dan said harshly, making sure that his tone was as hard as he could manage.

“Then why did you ask me?”

“I don’t know, just shut up.” Dan growled. He usually didn’t try to end arguments that childish way, but he didn’t know what else to say. There was nothing else to say besides the truth, and that wouldn’t happen. “Just go get your stuff so we can start the lesson before new years.”

Phil nodded and sighed.

“I will.”

* * *

Two days after, the, uh-  _incident_ , as both liked to call it; none of them spoke a word to each other.

“That’s why I need you to settle down with your songs until friday next week.” Phil thoroughly explained as he wrote the objectives to be made by the class. “Any questions?”

The answer was silence, as usual.

Miraculously, the students were quiet today.

Maybe they noticed the different air around their teachers.

Or maybe God just decided to give them a slack on the teasing.

Whatever the reason for this, it made both men more than grateful.

“Alright, you’re free to go.” The paler adult clapped the chalk away and started to erase the writings on the board once he was sure the children were finished on taking notes.

“Kirkland, Mr. Vargas told me to tell you that he was waiting for you in Art class until four thirty.” Dan’s firm voice announced to- what’s that kid’s name?- _Arthur_ , who grumbled under his breath and ran out immediately.

“Since when did you started doing favours?” Phil chuckled albeit sure that he was just going to frown at him again.

And Dan did.

Another downward curl of his mouth that showed how much distaste he has for Phil.

And then another downward hurl in Phil’s gut when he made said gesture.

“You know, I don’t really understand you.” He blurted before he could shut his mouth.

 _Shit_.

“What?” Dan furrowed his brow.

“I just…” Phil trailed off. “I just don’t get you.”

“What do you mean?”

“Sometimes you are friendly and light like you are fine with me being with you, but sometimes, like now, you’ll snap my neck off the moment you hear me breathe.”

Okay maybe Phil was exaggerating.

But what? It felt like that to him. Dan’s eyes constantly flicker between his emotions, Phil’s been aware of that since day one.

Yet really? Does he really know Dan, at all? Years fucking passed, Philip; keep up.

“Oh?” The brunet spoke with a low tone. Ice cold dead. “Am I?”

“I didn’t mean it to sound like-”

“You think you’re the only one?!” Dan retaliated even before Phil could explain his words whilst he stood up from his chair and slammed hard his palms on the wooden desk, not bothering to hiss at the burning pain the sudden impact caused on his hands.

“You think…” He spoke again; but this time, his voice softer than a ghost’s whisper. “You think you’re the only one…? The only one who doesn’t understand?”

“Dan I-”

“Well tough luck, Lester!” Phil watched him laugh humourlessly and saw pain gleam in his eyes.

“You’re the one to talk.”

The charcoaled-hair snapped his head. “What?”

“You’re the one to talk.” Dan repeated. “You’re as fickle as London’s bloody weather. Shit and confusing as fuck.”

“Excuse me?” Phil breathed.

“You heard me, Phil.”

“ _I’m_ the one confusing? Well I’m sorry Dan, I never knew you got blind on the past few years!” Phil chuckled, this time him being humourless.

“Oh I’m the one wrong now? Who’s the one being a clingy bastard who couldn’t understand the fucking words ‘it’s over’?!”

Dan’s gaze dropped when he said the sentence and felt Phil stiffen in his stand.

“Don’t say it like that…” He whispered slowly.

Dan wanted to yell at him. Tell him how stupid he is to act like a fucking teenager despite being an adult.

But the words that tumbled out of his mouth were useless.

“You just-” The younger of the two frustratingly sighed and ran a hand to his brown curls. “You confuse me so much. So, so, _so_ , much.”

Phil didn’t say anything.

But Dan didn’t give a shit. He can’t pick up the phrases he said to return time.

“You- you give me so many fucking emotions. I can’t understand them all and I hate it. I hate the fact that I can’t understand how my own brain works and it’s all your fault. I hate that even though we were supposed to be over you keep on trying to get me to like you, platonic or not. I hate the fact that even though I push you away so many times you still attempt to acknowledge my fucking presence as if the world would stop if you don’t. And I hate the fact that even though I should be forgetting about you, you still keep on popping on my head-”

“Daniel, please I-”

“No, you’re _not_ interrupting me. I’m going to speak my mind for this one time. I hate you so much Phil. I hate you so, so much. I can’t explain in words on how much I hate you. I want to fucking punch you whenever I see your strikingly pale appearance in the corridor or whenever your gleaming blue eyes that shone as if it’s your luckiest day ever. I hate you to the point where I can’t confirm to myself if I’m being truthful to myself.” Dan lowered his eyes. He doesn’t want to see Phil’s face.

“It’s just that- Even though I feel rage whenever I see you, with the burning wish of my fist coming in contact to your face is overwhelming, I just want to fucking punch you so much; but sometimes, I don’t know why, but I want to feel your lips against mine. I look at you, and then I realise that I want to beat you but, like now, _right now_ , I want to kiss you so badly...” He nearly lost his breath on the words he had said. He doesn’t even know where the last part came from; but he was being absolutely honest.

Then Phil muttered something to him, his tone as clear as day.

“Then why don’t you?”

The cause of the silence for the next few seconds were not caused by fuming emotions, but rather, the work of lips pressed against each other.

* * *

_“Hey, nice fit.” Dan complimented as he saw Phil walk outside the fitting room._

_“Does the colour look good on me?” Phil hesitatingly asked and fumbled his hands._

_He could feel Dan’s brown orbs travel all over him._

_“Yeah. You have a great body anyway.” The brunet managed to say without stuttering._

_Is he doing it right? Flirting?_

_“T-thanks.” The other blushed. “I’ll uh, go pay this then.”_

_“Sure.” Maybe he’s not doing it right. But, hell, he’s sure as fuck that he could say one day how much he wanted to taste Phil’s lips and stay by his side the whole time._

 


	10. Stained glass

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which they are boring-ass teachers with a boring-ass relationship. In which they are supposed to be history, but then it didn’t look like it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Alice: mY TIME TO SHINE ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°) yh this chapter is like 80% written by me bc it uhh, has my uhh, specialty. yeh. anyways im sorry updating late(our timezones are like water and fire) but im tellin u it’s p much worth the wait. anyways b ye (the kudos oh my god tysm)  
> Sofie: yooo, a little late update, but i promise this chapter is worth waiting for 8) by the way thanks for all the nice comments, me and alice gets so extremely happy and we get very motivated to write when we know that u guys appreciate it. enjoy!! (ﾉ◕ヮ◕)ﾉ*:･ﾟ✧  
>  **there is mature content in this chapter**  
>  (originally posted by [constipatedhowell](http://constipatedhowell.tumblr.com) and [athletichowell](http://athletichowell.tumblr.com) from tumblr)

Their lips collided, and Dan couldn’t believe what he was doing. It should feel wrong, but it felt so incredibly right.

He closed his eyes as soon as he could to avoid seeing Phil’s reaction. He could feel that Phil tensed up at first, but after a few seconds he relax and started to kiss Dan back.

Dan’s stomach was filled with a million butterflies, there was no denying that. It felt like he had been waiting for this moment forever, even though he had been denying it for so many years now.

Their lips moved in sync, like this was something they had been doing all their lives.

Well, it wasn’t far from the truth since they kissed a lot when they were together in high school, but they hadn’t been doing it for a very long time. Dan had been very certain that this wouldn’t happen again, but here he is as the weakling he is.

The urge for more started to grow inside of Dan when the kiss started to deepen.

He hated Phil so much for this, but he couldn’t help himself.

He wanted him, and he wanted him _now_.

His hands started to move across Phil’s chest, wanting to exploring every inch of his body. But he felt that something was wrong.

Suddenly, Phil grabbed Dan’s wrists and pushed him away, breaking the kiss. He had a scared expression over his face as he trembled where he stood.

“I can’t do it- I feel like I’m hurting you.”

Dan felt like he was going to break into a million pieces.

It was when the words Phil spoke reached his ear when he realised what the hell he was actually doing.

His mind was dizzy from the pure adrenaline that shot through his body. He had been kissing Phil. He had been giving in to the feelings he was the most scared of. He was letting himself feel things for Phil again, the thing that had been so unlikable and forbidden just a few days ago.

He felt so weak and the tears started to well up into his eyes. He wanted to answer Phil and tell him that it was okay, but his voice wouldn’t be able to be stable.

And if he started to talk, he would let his mental barrier down, allowing the tears to flow freely. The thing was that he didn’t want to show Phil how weak he was, and that Phil had such big effect on him.

He bit his eyes and turned his back towards Phil. The lump in his throat grew bigger and he realised that he wouldn’t be able to hold it for so much longer. It was either bursting out from this room really soon or start to cry right where he stood.

Phil’s eyes stared back at him. They were filled with concern and his previous expression was replaced.

Dan had been kissing him, and he had been wanting more. This was not how he wanted it to turn out.

He couldn’t hold it back anymore.

When his body gave in to the emotion he held inside of him he quickly turned around to burst of from the room. But before he could get anywhere he felt Phil’s hand around his wrist, stopping him from leaving.

“Dan, are you okay?”

Dan ripped free from Phil’s grip and turned around to meet his gaze. He knew that his eyes were watery, but he couldn’t simply find himself to care.

Phil opened his mouth to speak again and as soon as Dan saw it, he turned around again and left the room.

He knew exactly where to go. His feet moved automatically, without him thinking. A part of him wished that Phil would follow him, another part wishing he wouldn’t.

Dan wanted to be alone, but at the same time he didn’t. It was a mix of emotion that he had never felt before and he thought that he was going to go insane.

He couldn’t believe what he had just done. It was beyond wrong and Dan wanted to punch himself in the face, hard.

The sobs started to make their way from his throat and his feet moved faster.

After a walk that seemed like forever, he finally arrived at the music room. He threw the door open and closed it hard behind him.

When he made sure that no one could hear him, he let his guard down.

The emotions who weighed his chest down let loose and welled out of him. The sobs came out ugly and loud, and he had to fight them back to stop them from being heard over the entire school.

There was so many emotions at the same time.. The sadness and disappointed was so overwhelming that he didn’t know what to do.

When he caught a glance of the piano he played that stupid song on the either day, his mood started to shift over to anger.

He had never felt so much hatred towards an object before.

It was the piano’s fault that this had happened. If he hadn’t been playing that song from hell he wouldn’t been feeling this right now. Then nothing of this would have happened.

The lid was open from the day before, the white and black key mocking him. He clenched his fists hard and took a deep breath.

The memory from the other day when Phil entered the room while he was playing replayed in his head. The familiar feeling of butterflies returned amongst the other raging emotions in his body.

He got so angered that he, without thinking, slammed both of his fists on the white, shining keys. The piano made a loud, angry sound when his hands harshly pressed them down.

“Fuck you.” Dan whispered to the piano through gritted teeth like the piano would hear him.

He knew that it wouldn’t but it felt relieving to take your anger out on something. Especially on the object that caused this in the first place.

_Is this really happening?_

* * *

A door slammed and Phil returned to his senses.

_Fucking hell._

He moved his feet in auto-pilot and hurried to the room where he knew where Dan would be.

God, it’s so wrong.

It’s so fucking wrong.

He traced his lips and shuddered when he remembered how soft Dan’s lips were earlier.

It almost felt like home.

He stood there, pale and stoned, in front of the music room.

Phil gingerly twisted the knob and quietly sighed in relief when it turned to open yet he almost froze when he heard soft, _familiar_ , piano music coming from the room.

_He really did fucked up this time._

With a deep breath, he fully swung open the door and his eyes trailed over the lifeless pianist standing on the corner.

The familiar tune of a song waltzed to his ears again when he locked the door (in case someone walks in and sees how disastrous they are right now) and then another soft voice sang along. He felt his heart shatter like beautiful stained glasses that were once adored but thrown away for its beauty was just a mere illusion.

“ _And I know you don't feel right when I'm leaving._ “ Dan quietly sang as his fingers moved almost as if they played this song everyday.

“Dan-”

“What more do you want Phil?” The other uttered, his voice cracking just like the teenager he used to be.

“I know-”

“No you don’t. You fucking don’t.” The brunet spat, tears falling again. Phil felt the rush in his veins to run and hug him like as if nothing could go wrong anymore.

“Yes I do-” Phil sighed and walked closer to him.

“No.” But Dan just backed into the piano, an angry expression contrasting his brimming eyes with tears. “Get out.”

“Not this time, Howell.” Phil growled grabbed his wrists again, trying to restrain his incoming punches.

“Fuck off- let me go!” Dan cried. He looked so fucking broken and Phil just wanted to throw himself out of a window.

“I said no, Daniel.” The paler angrily muttered and backed him up more to the piano, their faces merely inches apart once again. “You never fucking listen, do you?”

“What are you-”

“Shut the fuck up. You always listen on your fucking self and never on others; do you know how fucking selfish you are?”

“Phil I-”

“You’re not even letting me speak. You’re even angry at me, when it was you who started it.”

“Phil-”

“I wonder if there’s a day where you will just listen to me, just listen to me speak my thoughts.”

Then Dan stared, not cutting him off anymore.

_He’s drowning; drowning at the pooling azure right in front of him._

He could feel Phil’s breath tickle his lips and all he wanted to do is grab him again, kiss him hard just like before.

But no, fuck no.

That can’t happen anymore.

He doesn’t want it.

He’s fucking scared of it.

Yet all he could do is cry.

And then it happened.

He felt Phil’s hands let go of his wrists but he didn’t struggle; rather, he stayed still and continued to stare at his eyes.

The warm hands of the other travelled to his neck, giving him goosebumps and then-

And then the world finally stopped.

The clock in the room halted its ticking, the children’s loud noises outside was drowned by the thumping of their chests, they could conclude it really stopped turning if it weren’t for their heartbeats beating loud as one.

Yet neither did care.

Because they’re home; in each other’s arms and hold.

And because that maybe- just maybe, because of their lips locking again.

Then neither made movement and stayed still, only their mouths working.

They felt it, the _wrongness_ of this act, but they couldn’t help it anymore.

They _craved_ for this.

Dan shifted in Phil’s hold and moved his arms to wrap it around Phil, to make him press his lips closer. And boy, did it surprise Phil. He didn’t expect him to kiss back, let alone _deepen_ the kiss.

“Hmn- Phil.” Dan moaned hotly in their snog and pressed their bodies closer; he wanted more.

“Dan- Dan, I think we should stop-” Phil parted away, leaving a trail of saliva connecting their swollen lips in the process.

“Please,” The brunet whimpered and tightly held to the front of his shirt. “Please, just this once, let me.”

“Dan I don’t want to hurt you-”

“Phil please, this will be the last time. Just, god, I _need_ you.”

And Phil Lester didn’t need another word, with a hesitating hand, he pulled him closer once more to rid of the air between them.

“Please, please, please-” Dan mumbled on his lips as they parted to dart their tongues, which moved as if they were _too_ used on doing such.

“Don’t worry.” Phil gently replied. He doesn’t really want to because he _knows_ it will just hurt Dan more than he had, but he can’t just stand how desperate he looked like right now. “I got you.”

He snaked an arm on his waist, groping the other’s bum softly.

And Dan moaned again to his mouth then bucked his hips forward, making Phil gasp softly.

“Do you really…?” He confirmed before doing any further actions.

“ _Yes_.” Dan breathed and rolled their hips again, then smirked when he heard a low groan come from Phil.

His heart beated like a fucking drum and Phil felt a huge weight crash him down.

 _Fuck_.

He mumbled a quick and quiet ‘I’m sorry’ to the brown locks in front of him and kissed the top his head afterwards, in case this situation could get any more shitty than it is.

Phil fumbled with the buttons of Dan’s shirt, as Dan did his, almost expertly. Again, they were teenage boys who used to be an item, Phil shouldn’t really be shocked.

But Dan just keep on surprising him; the way his movement turned swifter than before and how his lips moved against him as if he had been practising for the whole time they were apart.

“Did you have relationships after me?” Phil queried as he unbuttoned Dan’s jeans in a slow manner. He moved his mouth to his ear and nibbled on it for he didn't answer his question. “ _Answer me, babe._ ”

Dan felt a shiver run through his spine when Phil whispered in his ears and he could feel his groin tightening just because of how he fucking sounded.

“Y-yes.” He choked out; but more of it came out as a moan, because Phil started palming him through his boxers.

“How many?” Phil whispered again, his lips still not leaving near Dan’s ear.

“A-around four to six.” The brunet mumbled and Phil could’ve sworn his blood rushed with jealousy.

“Oh?” He continued to tease, despite the small burst of anger in him. “Were they better than me?”

Dan flinched at the question. “I don’t know.”

But all he could see was Phil pulling away from his ear and smirking smugly at him. “How about now?”

In that spur of moment, Dan saw Phil’s hand dipping inside his boxers and he nearly screamed.

“Fuck- fuck, yes- oh my god- Philll.” He writhed against the piano his back was against to.

Phil chuckled to himself, pleased that he still manages to make Dan moan his name like the old whore he was for Phil.

He stroked him faster, earning a gasp of his name every now and then.

Then he had an idea.

He moved forward and attacked Dan’s neck, biting softly at the tanned skin.

“Oh shit- Philphil- nn-not the neck.” The younger panted.

“What’s wrong with the neck?” The other feigned innocence.

“You fucking know what’s it about my neck.” Dan growled but shifted to a moan still when he felt Phil’s teeth brush against his collarbone, sucking and nipping at it that will surely leave a mark.

“I don’t know anything, Daniel.” Phil giggled and continued his marking and pumped faster.

“Oh god, oh god, fuck fuck f-phil, Phill.” Dan whimpered again and pulled Phil away from his chest and brought their lips together instead, their tongues hungrily dancing with each other.

Phil knew he shouldn’t feel a thing. Dan was just driven by mad lust. It doesn’t mean anything.

“Shit, Phil- I’m so close, I’m so close.”

Phil gave him one long hard pump and he saw Dan’s load spill on his hand.

Then he watched the ecstatic face of the other as he rode his orgasm, his lips quivering and whole body trembling to the sheer pressure.

Then his lips shook with the words that brought them both to reality once again.

_“I love you, Phil.”_

The raven-haired man widened his eyes and his brain didn’t register the whole happening.

_Did he just-_

“Shit,” Dan mumbled, panic rising in his voice. “I didn’t mean to- It’s nothing.” He tried to brush off and quickly did the buttons of his jeans and shirt. “It was just a force of habit, really.” He was fixing his hair and wiping his load clean from Phil’s hand, which was stoned pale. “Don’t think too much about it, I- I need to go.” He even fucking diverted his gaze. “Sorry about that, bye.”

And with that, Dan Howell left the room.

He left the room and Phil Lester remained.

But Phil Lester was different, he was crying.

Not because of sadness. Not because of happiness.

But of pure confusion.

His crotch even fucking hurt because he only managed to pleasure Dan, not him.

_He’ll need to take a wank later._

But right now? He couldn’t give a single shit.

Dan just said ‘I love you to him’ and he doesn’t know how to fucking react.

Is he going to do what he said?

_‘Don’t think too much about it?’_

Is that who Phil is to him now, a fucking hole where he just spews his bullshit?

And Phil was just right after all.

The beautiful stained glass was just merely an illusion to hide the ugly reality of the truth.

* * *

 

One million thoughts spun around in Dan’s head.

He tugged at his hair and his breathing was quick as well as heavy.

_He fucked up._

_He fucking fucked up._

He didn’t know what to do or where to go. His mind was foggy and there was no way he would be able to function like a normal human being the rest of the day.

Neither would he be able to act normal around Phil anymore today.

He needed to get out of here, he didn’t want to speak or see anybody, just collapse in his bed and sleep.

So he did. He checked if he had his keys in his pocket and walked the straight way home.

The head teacher would probably not be happy the next day, but Dan was too fucked up to care.

That was a problem for another day. For now, he just wanted to be alone.

* * *

 

_“So- uhm, do you want to go all the way in or- uhh just…?” Phil’s face heated when he popped the question, his mind blurry on what they are about to do._

_“I don’t know.” Dan answered nonchalantly, albeit his face redder than the other’s. “Do you want to go all the way?”_

_“I do.”_

_“Then I do too.”_


	11. Darcy

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which they are boring-ass teachers with a boring-ass relationship. In which they are supposed to be history, but then it didn’t look like it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Alice: nice holla ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°) idk why theres a food mention on the warnings but sof kept on putting it there so yh anyways holla patrick is updated goddamn. enj oy <333  
> Sofie: okay so here is another chapter for you. honestly, we are having too much fun writing these chapters, idk what to do with my life when it’s over. enjoy (◕‿◕✿)  
>  **tw suicide & food mention**  
> (originally posted by [constipatedhowell](http://constipatedhowell.tumblr.com) and [athletichowell](http://athletichowell.tumblr.com) from tumblr)

Dan sighed as he threw the entrance doors to the school open. He was not ready for this day at all.

Due to yesterday’s event, he hadn’t been sleeping, not even for a minute. The thoughts had been spinning around in his head the entire night and his mind had been completely awake.

As someone who isn’t so very good at dealing with sleep deprivation, this day was probably going to be hell.

He was probably going to be confronted by the head teacher again and this time he might be even more angry because of how early Dan left yesterday without saying anything.

This time around he had no valid excuse. He couldn’t tell him the truth, it would probably anger him even more.

A handjob in the music classroom during school time was probably not the best thing to tell the head teacher, was it?

No, that wouldn’t work.

When he walked towards the teacher’s lounge, like every other morning, he tried to come up with a new excuse. But his mind was slow and foggy. He couldn’t think of anything at all.

Oh, well. He might as well just take the scold he was going to get like the man he was.

He took a deep breath and opened the door to the lounge.

Just like he thought, a death glare from the head teachers was shot his way. He muttered under his breath and walked into his room, pretending that he didn’t saw it. Maybe, but only maybe would he be able to get away from it.

“Howell.” A growl was heard behind him and he tensed.

Fuck.

“Yes?” Dan spun around, trying to sound as nice as he could.

“You left without permission _again_. Why?”   
Dan opened his mouth to answer but got cut off by him again.

“And don’t lie to me this time.”

He closed his mouth and sighed loudly. He was way too tired for this shit.

“A friend called and wanted help with something urgent.” He smiled nervously and the head teacher just rolled his eyes.

_Way to go._

“You have one last chance Howell. If this happens again, you will get fired. Okay?”

Dan nodded, but felt the annoyance rise inside of him.

Great, 10 minutes at work and he is already angry. This day would be pure torture.

“Yeah, okay. I understand.” He nodded. He knew that it would probably increase his chances of not getting fired if he said something like ‘I’m sorry’, but he was too proud for that.

Why was is such big deal anyway, he worked very hard and he deserved a break or two sometimes. To fire him sounds like a huge exaggeration.

“Good.” The head teacher snapped and left.

Dan sighed for the millionth time this morning and shook his head. Though he felt relieved that that was out of the way.

_Just 8 more hours._

A snicker was heard behind him when he was about to leave for his lesson. It was a snicker that could only belong to one person.

_Gilbert._

“Hey Howell, where do you have your beloved Lester?” His obnoxious voice was heard over the whole lounge and Dan clenched his teeth as he turned around to make him shut up.

“What do you mean with that?” Dan snapped and the amused grin on Gilbert’s face just grew wider.

“He isn’t here today. I thought you knew that since you are boyfriends after all.”

A worried feeling started to replace the anger he felt.

Phil isn’t at work today?

He shot a discrete glance past Gilbert towards Phil’s workplace and sure enough, he wasn’t. A sickening feeling rose in his throat and all the annoyance had suddenly washed off of him.

“What’s the matter, Howell? You seem a little pale.” Gilbert waved the toast he was about to eat in Dan’s face. “You can have this if it makes you feel better.”

Dan frowned in disgust and showed Gilbert’s hand away in a swift motion. Gilbert wasn’t prepared and it flew out of his hand, landing on the floor.

“You can keep your bloody sandwich.” Dan snorted and Gilbert gasped overly dramatic.

“That’s not very nice of you!” The facial expression on his face reminded Dan of a grumpy toddler.

“Screw you.” Dan muttered and left the room, leaving Gilbert where he stood.

As he walked towards his classroom, the worry wouldn’t leave his body.

Shouldn’t Phil be at work by now?

He swallowed to stop the sickening feeling from getting any worse.

No, he was probably overreacting. Maybe he just overslept or felt a little ill today.

He would be fine.

_Or is he lying to himself again?_

His hands trembled when he opened the door to the classroom, almost like he was afraid of what he would find. Like he was afraid that he would find Phil still standing by that piano.

But, of course, the classroom was as empty and silent like it always was every morning.

He almost felt disappointed. He didn’t know what he had hoped, but judging from the way his body responded this wasn’t what he wanted to see.

_No, Phil wouldn’t be okay._

A wave of nausea washed over him when he remember yesterday. The state he probably left Phil in, and those four words which slipped out from his mouth.

_I love you, Phil._

Another wave of nausea hit him and he had to take deep breaths to not be sick. This day was just as ruined as yesterday. There was no way he would be able to survive this, not if he had to spend his entire this in this room, being haunted by the ghost of yesterday.

But if he left work today as well, he would get in serious trouble. Not only would the head teacher fucking _fire_ him, Gilbert would understand what’s up from the way Dan reacted earlier to his statement.

He cursed himself for being so obvious. He cursed himself for being so incredibly weak and giving in for the emotion right in front of Gilbert’s face.

If there was someone he didn’t want to seem suspicious in front of, it was him. Dan was so incredibly tired of Gilbert so he didn’t know what to do.

Honestly, he wanted to give him an uppercut but that was obviously not allowed so that wasn’t an alternative. He was left with one choice, and that was to just suffer through it until Gilbert was done with his little game.

He thought that he could manage that, though how he would handle it with the students was another question.

“Mr. Howell?” A girl’s voice was heard from beside him and he snapped out of his thoughts.

“Wha-, yes?” He cleared his throat and looked over towards where the voice came from. It was one his students standing in the door, with the entire class behind her.

“Are we starting yet?” She asked and looked around inside the classroom, looking for a reason as to why Dan hadn’t let them in yet.

Dan glanced over to the clock and saw that it was 10 minutes past the time they were starting the lesson.

“Fuck.” Slipped from his lips and he smiled apologetic towards the girl. “We are starting now, tell everyone to step inside.”

The students were soon behind their desks, looking at Dan waiting for this day’s instructions.

“So,” Dan sat down behind the desk in front of everybody and spoke up, but got interrupted by the same girl from earlier raising her hand. “Yes, what is it?”

“Say, where is your husband today?” The girl snickered, and a giggle spread across the students.

The memories from yesterday hit him painfully hard again. He had forgotten them when the students came, but now it returned again thanks to that remark.

Dan covered his face in his hand and took a deep breath. He _couldn’t_ do this.

“I don’t know.”

* * *

 

What day was it?

Phil had no fucking idea; he’d been on bed all day, not giving a shit on work.

_They could all go fuck themselves._

He stirred in bed, obvious discomfort in his body as he twisted around on the pale sheets that hugged his form.

A sharp pain shot through his forehead and all Phil could do is groan and turn again.

It’s all Dan’s fault.

_Dan._

What a fucking arsehole.

Playing with Phil’s crumpling emotions then what? Run off again?

He’s such a coward.

Probably the best.

With the streaming albeit blinding morning light he got out of bed and phoned the school about not going to work. Thankfully they were adults who understood.

_Unlike someone._

Hah, fuck that someone.

Phil decided last night that he’ll really forget about him, his whole existence, just as he had requested before.

Yeah, even though he was hurt by him repeatedly, Phil is a good guy; he’ll do what he wishes.

_He’ll get over him in no time._

He gazed at the amount of scattered papers around his flat and frowned.

He got somewhat crazy last night in writing, could be the reason why his hand ached so badly.

Sighing, he thought of cleaning up later instead; he’ll go out for now.

A walk outside to the park maybe. He just needs to take a fucking breather.

Dan had given him so much stress and all he wants is to forget about it.

Pretend his feelings for him didn’t exist.

Pretend Dan didn’t exist.

Maybe Phil too should cease to exist.

_Laughable_.

Sighing deeply, he poured himself some coffee and changed to a clean shirt and jeans a walk sounded really great.

He gulped down the bitter liquid and threw on a coat; yeah, a walk sounds really nice.

* * *

 

“What are you doing?” A soft voice asked behind him but Phil paid no heed; he just continued to stare at the pale blue green of the river that will soon have his floating corpse.

“Mister?” The voice prompted again and Phil finally turned around.

There was a child around the age of six and looked the utmost adorable.

“I’m going to jump.” Phil admitted, shifting his eyes to avoid the confused orbs that followed his every movement.

The girl gasped, her pretty green eyes going to wide and ran up to Phil, with her arms wrapping around his legs.

“Please don’t jump mister.” She pleaded with a muffled voice. “Please please please-”

“Little girl,” The adult interrupted and placed a hand above her blonde hair. “It doesn’t matter if I jump or not, No one loves a sad man like me.”

But the child wasn’t having it and hugged him tighter.

“No! I don’t want another one to jump on the river! My daddy already did and mummy left me!” She cried as tears streamed down her porcelain cheeks.

_What a monster Philip is to make a child cry._

“I’m sorry for you.” He grimaced. “But you shouldn’t be sorry for me. I’m a monster.”

Yet the girl only giggled. “You’re not a monster! You are too pretty to be!”

It was probably miraculous that Phil smiled again, probably thanks to the child.

“Thank you.” He warmly beamed. “What’s your name, little girl? My name is Phil.”

She giggled again. “It’s Darcy.”

Then they heard an older woman’s voice call from the distance and Darcy looked startled.

“That’s my guardian!” She exclaimed. “See you soon, Philly!”

Darcy smiled and hugged him again. “And please don’t jump.”

With that, she scurried away with a grin plastered on her face, leaving Phil all alone again.

The pale man sighed and glanced at the water, it looked disgusting compared on how alluring it was for Phil earlier.

Please don’t jump.

_Tomorrow doesn’t sound so bad._

* * *

Phil slowly trudged on the steps of his flat, a distant look on his face which caught attention of some older citizens but he managed to shrug them off with a smile.

_Fake_.

Finally pacing to the familiar hall of his apartment door, his heart raced when he saw the door ajar.

‘Is there a robber?’ His mind panicked and his blood pumped with anxiety.

The man walked gingerly and peeked inside, it was pitch black.

“Who’s there?” He called out, despite his lips trembling.

_No answer._

Maybe he’s just an idiot who forgot to close the door.

Nothing new, really.

With another deep sigh, he got in and locked the door, his hand searching for the light switch.

Relief washed over him when he saw that everything was into place just like how he had left it this early afternoon.

He placed his coat on an armchair and walked to the kitchen to get a drink; attempting to suicide is pretty hard okay.

Phil turned to turn the telly on and watch the evening news but the remote slipped down his bony fingers instead and his mouth could only freeze.

His eyes trailed all over the the form and his mind could only pound harder.

He wished it wasn’t real but his couch and the sleeping figure said otherwise.

_Dan_.

* * *

_ “Babe, if you want to see the sunrise again, you might wanna sleep in my bed.” Phil scolded to the passed out teenager on his bedroom floor. _

_He shook his head as the other just replied with a stifled groan._

_“Dan.”_

_“I’m up, I’m up.” Dan declared and attempted to stand yet failing, and crashed on Phil’s arms instead._

_“Come, the bed’s warm for the both of us.”_

 

 


	12. Anymore

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which they are boring-ass teachers with a boring-ass relationship. In which they are supposed to be history, but then it didn’t look like it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Alice: hi hi hi hi yes er are so sorry to give you this v v v late. timezones could really fuck their selves. hope u forgive us. ( ◔ ʖ̯ ◔ ) goddamn snofie (snail sofie)  
> Sofie: yoo, here you go, a long chapter for you guys. 8) also thank you alot for the nice comments, me and alice literally shout at each other in happiness. bless you all, ily. enjoy this chaptur :'))
> 
> (originally posted by [constipatedhowell](http://constipatedhowell.tumblr.com) and [athletichowell](http://athletichowell.tumblr.com) from tumblr)

_His eyes trailed all over the the form and his mind could only pound harder._

_He wished it wasn’t real but his couch and the sleeping figure said otherwise._

**_Dan._ **

* * *

 

‘What the fuck is he doing here?’ Phil didn’t even know how to answer his own question.

First of all, _how did he even get in here_?

And why the fuck is he sleeping on his couch? What, is he going to crash in to Phil’s flat this time?

_Ridiculous_.

With heavy and hesitating footsteps, Phil walked over to Dan and shook him gently despite his anger.

“Dan.” He called, hoping that this will wake him up.

“Mn?” The brunet groaned.

“Wake the fuck up.”

His brown eyes shot open and stared at the angry pools of blue in front of him.

“Phil.” He choked with a nervous smile. And then he stuttered on the next thing he said. “Welcome home, I guess.”

“Don’t ‘Welcome home’ me. Why are you here?” Phil tried to refrain himself from sounding extremely pissed. And _fuck_ , it’s so hard. “Have you come to fuck me up in here as well? Oh then what, run away again like the coward you are?”

He saw Dan flinch at him.

_It’s not like he’s lying_.

“About that,” Dan sat up from the couch. “I am thinking that-”

“Is that- Is that…?” Phil trailed off and snatched the paper behind him, looking all crumpled from being slept at.

“Did you read this?” The paler asked, his voice soft and almost as if he’s scared on what the other will say.

“Kinda.”

“Forget it. It’s nothing.”

But Phil knows that _Dan_ knows it’s not nothing.

“What were you saying again?” Phil stared at him in an icy glare and looked at the clock. “You have five minutes before I make you leave.”

Dan sucked in the cold air of Phil’s flat.

* * *

 “Mr. Howell!”

Dan snapped out of his thoughts from the sudden shout and looked up from his hands.

“Yea-” His voice cracked and he cleared his throat. “Yeah?”

“We have been calling you for 5 minutes.” A girl named Anna quipped, and her friends laughed behind her. “Are you thinking of Mr. Lester?”

Dan felt a blush creep up his cheek when he got called out on it.

_Fucking hell._

He cursed himself under his breath and tried to cover it up best he could by pretending to read something on his desk.

“No, I’m not.” He snapped, but the girls just continued to laugh. When the blush finally disappeared after a few moments, he looked up towards the girls and gave them a warning look.

“Do you need any help?” He asked harshly. There was no way he would be able to cover his bad mood up to this point.

“Nah, you just looked so distant so we wanted to help you snap out from the thoughts about Mr. Lester.”

The chuckle started to spread over the classroom and Dan hid his face in his hands again and groaned.

“Anna, I’m warning you. This isn’t the best of times to tease me.”

“It’s because your boyfriend isn’t here, is it?”

Without thinking, Dan slammed his fist on the desk hard, making the students jump in their seats. They looked up at him with frightened expressions, even Anna seemed to be taken aback.

“Quit it, or else I’m kicking you out from class.” He growled. Regret filled him when he saw the shocked expression on Anna and her friends’ face. He didn’t mean to snap like that, he really didn’t. It was just that he felt so incredibly shit at the moment and Anna happened to tease him at the worst of times.

“I’m sorry.” He sighed and rubbed his face with both his hands. “I just don’t feel well today.”

He swore to the God almighty that if she mentioned Phil again, he would leave.

Her face softened in a relieved expression and she smirked.

“It’s fine, I understand.” Dan noticed that she fought to hold back a giggle, and he clenched his teeth while giving her a death glare. When she saw it, she cleared her throat.

“I’m sorry, sir.”

Dan nodded as a gesture for forgiveness. “Thank you.”

He took a deep breath when the students stopped to pay attention to the whole situation around him. The more time that passed, the more convinced he got that Phil wasn’t going to come to work today.

_Where the fuck is he?_

He wanted to slap himself for being so worried. Since when did he care so much for how Phil felt and what Phil did? Somewhere in this mess he had lost his mind and there was no going back.

Another painfully long minute passed by.

_Please show up._

This is ridiculous. He shook his head and laughed at his own misery. Never had he ever been so worried for someone, and that this particular someone is Phil Lester is just _so_ absurd.

Besides, there was no reason to be so horribly worried. He was probably just sick or something. Surely, he wouldn’t stay home just because what happened yesterday, and he wouldn’t do anything stupid.

_Right?_

Dan was painfully aware of how he left Phil yesterday. The hurt in his clear, blue eyes when Dan abandoned him was not to be denied.

His stomach twisted and he had to take a deep breath. He needed to know why Phil wasn’t here. He needed to make sure that he wouldn’t do anything stupid just because of him, and that he would return to work in one piece.

When the lesson finally was over, he followed the students out from the classroom and locked the door. He wouldn’t be returning here anymore today.

“Hey Howell, good news!” Alex exclaimed when Dan was about to leave after he had been collecting his stuff.

“What?” Dan snapped, still feeling jealous over the flirting from before.

“Someone is moody today.” Alex laughed and nudged Dan’s arm. Dan just snorted in response to his childish behavior.

What’s with everyone teasing on him in this fucking place?

“Anyways,” Alex continued. “What I was about to tell you is that every teacher is free this afternoon!”   

Dan had to stop himself from shouting out of happiness. Now he didn’t have to worry about potentially getting fired because he is worrying about someone he isn’t supposed to worry about.

Instead, he just smiled and nodded.

“That’s great! I needed some free time.”

Needed was an understatement.

“Same here, same here.” Alex huffed. “By the way, do you know where Phil is to-”

“He is sick.” Dan blurted out to interrupt. He didn’t want to bring Phil up as a topic, especially not with Alex.

A frown formed on Alex’s face from how quick Dan had answered, but didn’t call him out on it and just nodded.

“Okay, that’s probably it. Well, I gotta go get some lunch now. I’m so incredibly hungry!”

Dan sighed in relief.

“Alright, same here. See you around.” Dan forced a smile and turned around to leave. He increased his walking speed when Alex shouted a goodbye back, wanting to get out of there as quickly as possible.

It took about 15 minutes to walk to his and Phil’s apartment complex. He was very, very happy that he and Phil lived on the same floor, because that meant that he could check Phil without seeming like he stalked him.

If Phil asked why he was there, he could easily go with the apology that he was on his way to his own apartment. He didn’t want it to seem like he was caring so much about Phil that he came to ask why he wasn’t at work.

But how was he going to get inside his apartment to actually talk to Phil if he didn’t want to use that excuse? He couldn’t tell him that he was accidentally knocking on his door when he was about to enter his own apartment. That would make very little sense and he doubted that Phil would be fooled by it.

The apartment complex was getting closer and he had to come up with something really quick. He decided that he would update him on how the project was going.

_Brilliant_.

He ran up the stairs like the _athlete_ he was and the second he knew it, he stood in front of Phil’s door.

The knocks echoed between the walls in the silent flat and Dan’s stomach twitched from nervousness.

Seconds passed by without anyone answering the door. He knocked again, but with the same result.

His breathing increased as he started to feel panicky.

He brought his hand down to the door handle and pressed it down. It wasn’t locked.

“Hello?” He called in the silent apartment.

When there was no answer, he stepped inside. Maybe Phil was asleep.

After he had taken a few steps inside, he realised how wrong this was. He was going inside Phil’s apartment without consent and to anyone watching, this would probably look like a robbery.

“Phil?”

Still silence. He wasn’t at home.

Dan swore under his breath as he walked further inside. Maybe there was a track somewhere that gave him any idea of where he had gone.

When he entered the lounge, his eyes traveled around in the room. It really looked like Phil lived here. It was clean and nicely decorated, with paintings on the walls and house plants on a few places. It was...nice.

_Bullshit_.

There was mess everywhere. Crumpled paper strewn across the room along with some forgotten pieces of socks. There was also a pen next to his foot and in one small step he could’ve stabbed himself.

_Is Phil really living here_?

He frowned upon his seemingly odd lifestyle. This wasn’t how the Phil he knew would want to live.

Phil was a bit messy, sure, but he didn’t particularly like to live in a mess. When they were together in high school, he usually complained over that he always left a mess after him wherever he went but that he didn’t like it that way.

Dan remembered that he thought it was quite hilarious. Someone who doesn’t like living in a mess usually doesn’t leave a mess behind them. That was why Dan remembered it, because it had left an impression.

When he picked up the pen and put it on the table he had, he noticed that there was a lot of papers sprawled out over it. They were laying like a mess, not any different from how the rest of the apartment looked. Some of them were crumpled, and some of them were blank.

The ones who caught his eye was the ones that were written on. That would explain why there was a pen on the floor.

He knew that he shouldn’t read them, and that being in this apartment at all is wrong. But the curiosity was too strong and this would maybe explained to him why Phil wasn’t at home.

There was more than one paper that was written on, so he just grabbed the first one he could reach.

He sat down in the sofa and took a look at the paper.

From the way the sentence’s were positioned, it looked like a poem. He couldn’t hold the curiosity back and started to read it.

> _Maybe it was the deepness of the chestnut pools_
> 
> _Or maybe it was the softness of the sun-kissed cheeks_
> 
> _Or maybe it was the sweetness of the berry lips_
> 
> _But all I really missed was the honey-like voice saying my name_

After reading the first part of it, he was really impressed. 

Did Phil write this on his own?

> _In all honesty, it’s a laughable story_
> 
> _Maybe because every time I settled my pen down_
> 
> _Tears fell down and stained this sheet_
> 
> _Staining more of our tainted memory_
> 
>  
> 
> _Give me a sigh and roll your eyes_
> 
> _But I could barely give a breath_
> 
> _Because every single time my eyes land on your figure_
> 
> _It’s like I’m reliving every reason why I’m still inlove with you_

His stomach sank from the realisation when he put the paper aside. It was a poem, and it sure as hell wasn’t a happy one.

The poem was written about him. He knew that Phil still had some feelings for him, but he didn’t know it was _that_ bad.

He found himself smiling when he picked the paper back up to read it again. His stomach was filled with butterflies and a warm feeling spread through his body when he thought about Phil sitting and writing this, only having Dan in his mind.

But the happiness was soon replaced with guilt and worry when he noticed that the paper was decorated with what looked like tear stains.

He moved his finger over one of them to make sure that he didn’t just imagine them.

But no, he didn’t imagine it. The stains were there, and they made him cold.

The thought of Phil writing poems about him was no longer as happy. It had instead turned into something that made this whole situation very sad. It also made him realise how sad the poem was.

Phil described it in the most depressing way possible. Dan didn’t understand how he, just moments ago, had been smiling over this. Phil was obviously not feeling good at all and Dan had been _completely_ oblivious.

The man swiftly crumpled back the paper and pushed it in his pocket; maybe he could ask Phil about this later.

He had to lay down on the sofa because he was starting to feel nauseous again. To leave something smelly on Phil’s floor wouldn’t really help him out in this situation.

His eyes began to feel heavy the second he managed to get comfortable. He didn’t realise how tired he was until he closed them.

A nap sounded very pleasing and he decided to take a quick one. Hopefully Phil wouldn’t be home until he woke up.

* * *

 Dan tried to regain his breath but his heart thumped louder on every second.

"I..." He started as his diverted away from the other's icy glare." I came here to apologise."

He then heard Phil huff air in front of him.

“It’s that all?” The coal-haired impatiently barked at him.

“Yes but-”

“Go.”

_What_?

“I said go.” The other snapped again. “If all you’re going to do is bullshit me with your ‘apologies’ then don’t even bother because you’ve given me enough.”

“I’m not even done yet!” Dan argued back and ran a sweaty through his fringe.

“What more?”

“I’ve been thinking…”

Phil snickered at him. “Shocking how you could actually think.”

But Dan just shot him a look and continued what he was about to say. “I’ve been thinking that maybe, this could work out.”

“ _What_ will work out?”

“Us.”

The paler took no moment’s hesitation to grab Dan by the arm and drag him towards the door.

“Don’t kick me out yet!” The brunet struggled in his grasp.

“Dan, can’t you see?” Phil asked lowly, his voice as quiet as the leaves fluttering in the wind. “I’m all troubled and sick of all the things you’ve put me through-” Dan felt a huge lump on his throat. “-I just can’t deal with you any more.”

“I know that Phil,” He tried to stop him from pushing him out the door. “But give me a chance! I’ve thought about it thoroughly and-” He thought he finally swallowed the lump. “And I- I still feel for you.”

“Dan, please.” Phil pleaded and hot tears fell down on his cheeks. Dan tried his best to resist the urge to kiss them all away. “You’ve left me so many times I don’t think I could bare being with you without having the paranoia of you leaving me.”

“But Phil- hear me out-”

“Why can’t you just figure out that I’m over you?”

“What?”

“Dan, I don’t love you anymore.”

The words rang through Dan’s ears and a wooden door was shut on his face.

He drew in a shaky breath and sniffed away the stupid tears that had streamed down when Phil spat the sentence on his face.

_I don’t love you anymore_.

He laughed humourlessly at the wood and fished the crumpled sheet of paper on his jeans.

Phil was right after all.

It _is_ a laughable story.

After all those days of Dan pushing away Phil, the tables turned and now he was the one desperately chasing Phil.

He shuddered and wiped the last falling tear with the sleeve of his shirt, finally deciding to go to his own flat.

The paper on his right hand remained open and Dan was more than glad he managed to get this earlier.

He’s got an idea.

He’s going to give Phil an answer, to finally end this whirlwind of shitstorms between them.

But he’s going to do it differently.

With a grim yet determined smile, he opened his apartment’s front door and immediately locked it, before scurrying away to the lounge.

And Dan could feel no better safety at cushion of his piano seat.

* * *

  _“Dan have you written any song yet?” Phil queried as he plopped down next to Dan on the floor, who was playing the intermission from Panic! at the Disco’s first album on his electric piano._

_“Nope.” The brunet answered blankly, not looking up from the black and white keys._

_“Oh.” Then Phil smiled. “If you plan on writing one, will you write it for me?”_

_Dan stopped playing and turned to his boyfriend, who have a cheeky grin on._

_“Of course.” Dan assured and pecked him lightly on the lips. “I’d write you a concerto, even.”_

_The paler could’ve sworn his lips had hurt from smiling too much._

 

 


	13. Liars

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which they are boring-ass teachers with a boring-ass relationship. In which they are supposed to be history, but then it didn’t look like it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Alice: ily. srsly. before u kill me and sof, ily. ALSO NICE WE HIT 1000 HITS. GOD BLESS THE KUDOS. I LOVE U ALL. (つ ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)つ  
> Sofie: this chapter is just [gross sobbing]. I have nothing else to say to be honest. (Alice is a meme), enjoy the chapter my loves (ﾉ◕ヮ◕)ﾉ*:･ﾟ✧
> 
> (originally posted by [constipatedhowell](http://constipatedhowell.tumblr.com) and [athletichowell](http://athletichowell.tumblr.com) from tumblr)

The silence of the apartment was hurting his ears.

Phil was sat on the sofa where Dan had previously been sitting, before Phil threw him out. His hands were tangled in his hair, tugging it harshly.

The poem was laying on the floor in front of him, but he felt too disgusted to pick it up again. Just the thought that Dan has read it makes him sick.

It wasn’t meant for him to see it.

_Maybe, this could work out._

Phil grabbed the pencil from the table and threw it hard across the room. It hit the wall on the other side of the room and broke, pieces of it scattered across the floor.

He groaned loudly.

_There goes his favourite pencil._

Dan.

Dan is such a fucking _idiot_.

Did he really think that he could fuck around like he did, break into Phil’s home and tell him that everything could work out again?

Well, obviously he could, but it didn’t help Phil the slightest. It was like he thought that the world revolved around him. Everything he did and said was the right way to go, and when he wanted change he would get it.

But no, Phil would prove him wrong. This time, he fucked up. And he fucked up _badly_.

Even though Phil’s heart still ached for Dan, even though he would do everything to get him back, he wouldn’t let him win.

He would prove to him that he couldn’t just behave like he did, and prove to himself that he wasn’t weak.

But who was he fooling, he was weak. Weak for Dan.

He stood up from the sofa and sighed loudly. He didn’t want to feel like this. The poems wouldn’t work out as good anymore, since Dan knew he wrote them.

What was Dan doing in his apartment anyway? Didn’t he know that it’s _illegal_ to break into other people’s home?

It probably wasn’t in his world. His huge ego probably blocked those thoughts out.

He was starting to get so angry that the anger turned into tears, which lingered in his eyes. It was so frustrating, he didn’t know what to do.

The scent of Dan’s cologne still lingered in the air, which didn’t really help. It was the same old cologne that Dan had back in high school. The cologne that Dan had asked Phil about, he wondered if it smelled good. Phil had nodded, pulling him into a close hug and buried his face in the crook of his neck. He didn’t remember the name of it, but he was sure that he would remember the bottle anywhere if he saw it.

He had been honest with the cologne, it did smell really good. And when it mixed with Dan’s ordinary smell, it was even better.

This wasn’t something he wanted to be reminded about, but the scent brought it all back. A strong feeling of regret washed over him. He shouldn’t have kicked him out. He should have let him stayed, should have given him another chance.

_No._

He slapped himself mentally to break the train of thoughts he was slipping into. The promise he made to himself was going to stand strong. Dan was not going to get under his skin again.

Phil didn’t love him anymore.

_I don’t love you anymore._

His own words echoed in his head. The look on Dan’s face flashing before his eyes.

He doesn’t love Dan anymore.

_Or does he?_

He took a deep breath and the cologne reminded him of it’s presence, tingling his senses. With large steps and the tears in his eyes, he stepped into the bathroom and grabbed his own cologne. Without hesitation, he returned to the lounge, pressed the head of the bottle down and sprayed the content around the room.

When he stopped, he coughed from the sudden and strong smell the large amount of cologne had spread across the room. But as long as there were no tracks of Dan left, he was more than happy.

He smiled at himself because of what he had just done.

That wasn’t so hard.

If _only_ it was that easy to erase his presence from his mind.

* * *

Dan moved his messy fringe out of his face as he looked down at his work.

He sighed in relief when he put down the pen on the table, feeling proud over what he had managed to accomplish.

“Jesus, that took long.” He mumbled quietly to himself and looked over towards the ticking clock on the wall. A smile made its way over his face when he realised that he had managed to do it under 12 hours.

Impressive.

As he snapped back to the real world from being concentrated for so long, he finally paid attention to his body’s needs. His stomach growled from being without food for so long, and he was very tired. He also noticed that the sun’s down and the apartment was dark aside from the little light he had been using to light his work up.

He stood up and stretched his body, smacking his mouth.

He’s not exactly sure how this will work out, but he wanted to give this to Phil.

Then maybe he could move to a different department.

The elementary department doesn’t seem so bad.

Or if worse comes to worse, maybe he’d resign.

He deserves it all, anyway.

* * *

 

The girls huddled around their music teacher, playing melodies of their drafted songs.

The sight somehow made Phil’s heart clench.

“I like how you decided to go crescendo in here, whilst you have bass in the background.” Dan complimented with genuine smile. It was true, he loved how the students did the style of their piece.

“Thank you sir.” The leader of the group blushed.

“You are welcome. Just finish up your lyrics and you’re set for the event.” The teacher patted her back, sending the group off.

And Phil just wanted to come over just like how the girls did.

If only Dan didn’t fuck it all up.

If only _he_ didn’t fuck it all up.

They are both fuck ups.

_Maybe that’s why they seem so desperate for each other._

He watched his fingers return on dancing on the slim black and white keys, playing another different song.

It sounded _so_ heartwarming and Phil only wants to curl up into a ball or scream how confused he felt right now.

Why does Dan kept on playing with his emotions like that?

It fucking _hurts._

The shrill sound of the school bell cut off his unnecessary thoughts, snapping him back to his monochrome reality.

Too bad.

His life is like a piano. Both black and white and Dan won’t stop on playing around.

And Dan playing sad harmonies doesn’t either because it just literally spells out how Phil is.

He just wants to run away.

The pale man stared at the empty room before him, only drowning with the sound of Dan’s piano, Dan himself not looking up even for a second.

He needs to leave, before Dan tries to do anything else.

Abruptly, Phil stood up from his chair and gathered his papers to sign at home.

He was about to escape (in Phil’s terms at least) when Dan started playing another set of different chords, this time sweeter and gentle.

He couldn’t help but look back.

It sounded almost as if Dan was talking to him, begging for forgiveness.

_“Maybe it was the clearness of azure,”_ He heard Dan sing along to the soft melody, his fingers not missing a beat, his breath not hitching for a second.

_“Or maybe it was the fairness of pale skin;”_

Why does it sound so familiar?

_“Or maybe it was the redness of plump lips, but all I really needed was to hear your deep voice envelop me.”_

He walked towards the brunet, who didn’t seem to pay attention at all.

_“I know it’s a laughable story, I know what you meant.”_

“Dan.”

_“But hear me out once more, because I still miss your warmth.”_

“Dan-”

_“I told you I don’t love you, yet you told me you do.”_

_“Then I told I do, yet you told me you don’t.”_

And Phil could only break inside.

_“I just want you to know, that no matter how much you hate me right now,”_

_“Is that I miss everything and all I want to do is to hold your hand.”_

Silence.

It’s so beautiful, yet so confusing.

“Why?” Phil barely whispered, not daring to look up.

But Dan just laughed. If there was humour. “I told you, didn’t I? I love you.”

“Dan,”

“I know, I know you don’t.” He heard him chuckle darkly. “But I just want to say to you that I regret all what happened.”

“What?”

“Every shit storm I caused you, you’ll never know how sorry I feel right now, it’s like my chest’s pumping too hard and my soul could shatter any moment.”

Yet Phil knows that feeling better than anyone else.

“What are you doing then?” The black-haired queried.

“I’m- I’m moving to another department, the elementary.” He could’ve sworn he heard a sad smile. “We’ll have different schedules, you won’t see me again. Or if you want, I’d resign and move on a different school instead.”

“Dan…”

“I’d give up anything, just to make you happy again.”

The wind blew in its coldness, the curtains flowing through the sunset stained room.

“It’s all too late, you don’t feel the same anymore; it’s all too late, just for me to make you smile. I’ve broken you too much.”

“Please don’t-”

“No, hold it back. Don’t say anything anymore, I know. I’m gonna leave now.” Dan shuffled around and stapled the piano sheets sitting in front of him and handed them to Phil. “But I want you to take this. Even if I seem like a fucking asshole right now, giving you a memorabilia of our relationship. I’m not giving it so you can have something to remind me of, but rather, I’m giving you all of how I feel, Phil. This is how I poured all of my emotions last night.

“When I saw your poems I just felt something inside me click, all of my thoughts snapped at once. I knew, deep within, that since day one, I was still madly inlove with you. When I left you before, the second I left your side, I was still madly inlove with you. When I lost my virginity on some one-night stand, I knew inside my drunken mind I was _still_ madly inlove with you.

“And now here I am, gazing at the love of my life, bidding him goodbye just because I am too late.” Dan shook his head, trying to play it off like he wasn’t crying. “So yeah.”

He came up to Phil, and patted his arm gingerly, as if he’s almost afraid he’ll crumble in his touch. “Goodbye Phil, I love you. Ever since you scraped my knee when you bumped on me with your bike, until now.”

With that, the scent of Dan’s cologne left Phil’s nostrils and left.

Phil needs to do something.

Something quick.

He stared at his polished black shoe, reflecting his messed up state, almost as if it’s mocking him.

Then his legs just moved on its own.

They ran, Phil had no idea where to, but it ran outside the room. Then to the hallways, to the stairs, then to the gate. Where a lone brown haired man stood and shook.

“Dan!” Phil called and ran towards him. He stopped at a reasonable distance and pulled his arm to engulf him in hug.

“W-what?” Dan choked as he felt Phil’s warmth embrace him. He couldn’t help but wrap his arms around the man.

“Please don’t leave me.” Phill whispered in his hair. “I barely breathed when you left me last time, if you leave again, you might finally take away my breath.”

“Phil,” The younger struggled in his grasp and forced himself to look up at him. “I’m doing it for you, I don’t want you to feel hurt again. I already stepped on your emotions too many times.”

“You don’t understand, do you?” The paler asked, his voice as faint as how the birds chirped in the distance.

“Understand what?”

“I’m a bad liar, Dan.”

“What?”

“I’m not good in lying.”

“Yeah so?”

“Jesus Christ.” Phil rolled his eyes and pulled him again for another hesitant hug, but Dan melted instantly. “Dan, even though you gave me so much depressing and confusing emotions, I _still_ love you.”

“But didn’t you say…”

“Like I said, I’m a bad liar.”

Then Dan stared at him, his eyes gleaming with hope.

“I- I…” Phil started and finally returned his gaze. “I forgive you.”

Dan looked like he was about to rejoice but Phil interrupted him before he could scream. “But I want to start all over again.”

“Hi, I’m Dan Howell and I’m a raging homo for Phil Lester.” The brunet rolled his eyes but Phil could only curl his lips to a smile.

“Hi, I’m Phil Lester and I’m _also_ a raging homo for Dan Howell.”

In that moment was when Phil was sure it was the happiest he had ever seen Dan.

He lunged at him, this time him initiating the hug.

“I missed you.” He mumbled on Phil’s shoulder, inhaling his raspberry scent.

“I missed you too.” The coal-haired giggled and tightened his hug.

Then Dan loosened his grip on Phil’s waist and stared at him again.

“What?”

“May I?” Dan asked, shyly gesturing at his lips.

“Any day, Howell.”

Dan gave him a bashful smile, before shifting his feet to lean down to Phil.

And when he did press their lips, it felt like they were back in high school again.

* * *

_“I love you so so much Danny.” Phil snickered and peppered his boyfriend’s neck with butterfly kisses._

_“Mn, not there.” Dan moaned but smiled still. “I love you so so much too Philly.”_

_“You know what I love?” The other prompted while slotting his hand with his._

_“Me?” The tanned boy suggested with a smirk._

_“Mhm, but you know what I also love?”_

_“What?”_

_“That no matter how much we fight over things, we always find a way to forgive each other every time.”_


	14. Silenced

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which they are boring-ass teachers with a boring-ass relationship. In which they are supposed to be history, but then it didn’t look like it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Alice: this chapter is more of a filler but eh. i wrote most of this chapter again bc sof has a life and i dont sigh. it’s ending and im not o k (ノ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)ノ︵┻┻  
> Sofie: OH NO ITS SOON COMING TO AN END. im so sad because it has been so fun writing it, im really really gonna miss it. (we need to make more collabs js) ily all, enjoy 8')
> 
>  
> 
> (originally posted by [constipatedhowell](http://constipatedhowell.tumblr.com) and [athletichowell](http://athletichowell.tumblr.com) from tumblr)

_“May I?” Dan asked, shyly gesturing at his lips._

_“Any day, Howell.”_

_Dan gave him a bashful smile, before shifting his feet to lean down to Phil._

_And when he did press their lips, it felt like they were back in high school again._

* * *

The paler one shifted his weight to his other foot, leaning up more to fit perfectly Dan’s lips. Not that they don’t fit perfectly before, but Phil just wants to savour this moment in case Dan runs away again.

He gripped the other’s wrist tightly, his fingers digging deep to the clothed wrist.

“I’m not running away anytime soon.” Dan mumbled against his lips.

“I’m not sure if I can trust you about that immediately.” Phil shook his head.

“I don’t need you to trust me completely, Phil.” The brunet flashed him a gentle smile. “I just need you to know that I am still madly inlove with you.”

“You’re still a sap, I see.” Phil giggled and nuzzled his face on Dan’s neck, placing soft kisses all over.

“But you’re no better than me about it.”

“Can’t disagree with you.”

This time, Dan giggled, probably after for such a long time.

And Phil didn’t really change for he still found Dan’s giggle adorable and can’t help but kiss him again.

“What does this make us?” He muttered and rested his head on the other’s shoulder, almost afraid on what Dan would answer.

_He’s not running away, Phil_.

“Whatever you want, babe.” Phil felt a hand run through his hair and he purred at the affection he was getting from Dan.

“Being together...again, sounds very nice.”

“What are you blushing about?” Dan lifted his chin to see his flustered appearance, chuckling at how cute Phil looked like when his cheeks are stained red.

“Nothing.” Phil tried to pass and return to his last position but Dan’s grip on his chin stopped him.

“But babe, I still haven’t heard it from you.” The brunet teased further.

“Excuse you. You’re the one who’s supposed to do it.” The older argued, but nevertheless blushing on what Dan is making him do.

“Come on, I was the one who did it last time!”

He heard Phil inhale some air and stuttered on his words. “D-Dan,”

“Yes?” Dan smirked.

“Your hair is so messy right now.”

Dan stood there and he didn’t know if he should be annoyed on how Phil ruined the mood or how he thought he would be the one who would ask him out.

“Phillll.” He whined.

“Stop acting like a child.” The coal-haired uttered sternly. “We’re together, shush.”

“Very mature, Philip.” The younger grinned. “Oh and-”

“What?”

Phil watched Dan slot his hand with his. “I’m not lying when I said I’ve always wanted to hold your hand again.”

“God, you’re so cheesy.” Phil cringed but smiled widely. “But I love it. I love it when you’re cheesy. Jesus, I just love you.”

“Love you too.” Dan flashed him a small grin and leaned down to catch his lips in a sweet kiss. “Hey, do you wanna come over mine?”

“Doesn’t sound bad.” His _boyfriend_ , oh _god_ , his heart is soaring when he referred to Dan with that word. It felt like _home_. He can’t stop smiling.

“It’s friday too, you can stay over if you want.” Then Dan glanced at Phil. “What are you smiling so much about?”

“Nothing.” Phil shook his head. “I’m just so happy we’re together again.”

“Me too.” Dan lifted their clasped hands and pecked the back of Phil’s hand. “So, staying over?”

“If that counts cuddling, I’m in.”

“How about sex?”

“Don’t get too cocky, Daniel.” Phil snickered. He also loved it when they referred to each other with full names.

“Just trying to see how far my luck would go.” The tanner had a silly grin on his face. “Although I think the luckiest day I’ve ever had was when you sat next to me in Science class.”

“Oh my god-”

And then they burst out laughing, the sun’s orange light kissing their bodies.

“To my house?” Dan suggested.

“Alright you sap.”

* * *

“Do you want pizza or Chinese?” Phil heard Dan ask as he settled down on the sofa, his eyes trailing all around the place.

_So this is ‘Dan’._

“Pizza please!” He yelled back in response.

“Okay!”

Dan returned shortly afterwards, jumping down the sofa and diving down to Phil’s chest.

“Twenty minutes.” He announced and snuggled to Phil, who as eagerly wrapped his arms around his waist.

“I wonder what we can do in twenty minutes…” And Dan knew that Phil had a glint on his eye right now.

“We can play video games.” He teased, receiving a pout from him.

“Go make-out with your Halo 3 then.”

“I’d love too, but they won’t kiss me back like you do.”

“Kiss me and see if I would.”

The brunet rolled his eyes at how childish Phil is acting. But if it gets to kiss Phil he’s always up for it. So either way, he’s grateful.

He leaned down slowly, then ghosted his lips on Phil’s, almost touching with a sliver of breath.

“Oh for fuck’s sake.” Phil groaned under him and pulled Dan’s head with both of his hands, crashing their lips.

Dan could’ve smiled if it weren’t for the lips roughly moving against his.

“Mn, Phil-” Dan moaned slightly and straddled the other, then snaking his arms around his neck. “What happened to not kissing back?”

“Shut your trap.”

They sat there on the dimly lit lounge of Dan’s flat, the only light was the small lamp from small lamp standing in the corner of the room.

Phil pulled away, catching his breath. He latched his mouth on Dan’s exposed neck, biting softly at the tan flesh.

“Can I mark you?” He asked tentatively.

“Yeah.” But Dan could only moan as Phil’s teeth sunk down on his sensitive skin. “I see you still haven’t forgotten where my sweet spot is.”

“Well if you did it loads of times before, it retains in your memory you know.” Dan blushed at Phil’s answer and remembered how they used to mark each other back in high school, only covering it up with their mum’s make-up.

Then Phil sucked on the spot, running his tongue lightly at the slowly forming hickey.

“At least now I can say you’re mine again.” He expressed and pulled Dan down again to lock their lips.

_God he won’t stop kissing him_.

It was almost- almost perfect, if it weren’t for the _goddamn_ pizza arriving at the door.

“I’ll be back.” Dan pecked Phil’s lips once again, then jogged to his front door to get the delivery.

He returned seconds later, two pizza boxes in hand and a large bottle of coke on the other.

“Want to watch a movie?” The younger prompted.

“Yeah!” Phil replied almost too enthusiastically.

“Alright, what do you want?”

“High school musical.”

“ _Oh my god_.”

* * *

When the two men walked together to the school that next day, a thought crept into Dan’s mind. He had been so busy being so incredibly happy with Phil yesterday that he didn’t realise.

How were they going to act at work?

He glanced over to Phil who walked beside him, an amused smile lighting his face up. When he noticed Dan staring at him, he turned around and met his gaze.

“Is something wrong?” He asked and the smile on his face faded.

“I just thought about something.” Dan scratched his neck. “How are we going to act at work?”

“Oh, don’t worry.” Phil’s eyes sparkled in the morning sun as he smiled again. “Everyone will be fine with it, I mean with all the-”

“No.” Dan interrupted with worry raising in his voice. “Can we please not tell them about us?”

Phil frowned.

“Why not?”

Dan hesitated. He wasn’t sure himself. It was just something about the thought that the whole school would know about them that didn’t feel comfortable. If the teasing was bad _now_ , he wouldn’t be able to imagine how much worse it would get. It felt like it would get too much, and that it would maybe damage their relationship.

If they were never going to be left alone and be constantly teased, he was afraid that it wouldn’t work out in the end. Now when he _finally_ managed to accept his returning feelings for Phil and collected the courage enough to welcome him back to his life, he didn’t want to lose him over something stupid like this.

“I don’t want to out us yet.” He smiled apologetic and Phil nodded in response.

“That’s okay.” He smiled and pecked Dan’s lips. “We’ll do it when you are comfortable with it.”

“Thank you.” Dan wrapped an arm around Phil’s waist and pulled him closer.

_God, he loves him._

It was so foolish of him to keep pushing these feelings back for so long. Even though he had been so scared of it, it wasn’t as bad as he thought it would be. Needless to say, he was happier now than he was before.

The walk eventually came to an end and they had to let go of each other. They had to act discreet among the students and that was going to be challenging.

To go from naturally being angry at each other all the time and having a very tense atmosphere around them to actually enjoying each other’s company and pretend that they were angry with each other was going to be a tough transition. The students had eyes like hawks and they would notice right away.

Even when they both entered the teacher’s lounge together, their coworkers curiously looked over towards them when they saw that the two men was less than 32 feet apart. It was an unsual sight indeed, but they ignored the other teacher’s stare and parted ways without saying anything.

Dan could see in the corner of his eyes that Gilbert smirked towards him, but ignored him.

It made Dan very annoyed that Gilbert got how he wanted. He was just sitting there, mocking him with his ugly smile. Dan was going to make sure that Gilbert was the last one to know.

“How are we going to do this?” Phil asked while they made their way to their first lesson. “I mean, about the thing between…” He gestured with his hand between him and Dan to show Dan what he meant.

Dan grabbed his hand and pulled it down, looking around to see if anyone heard or saw.

“Phil, for fucks sake!” He growled quietly and gave him a hard gaze.

“Sorry!” Phil whispered back. “But how-”

“Just don’t show it.” Dan interrupted. “Be discreet and try to act like we did around each other when we were _just_ friends.”

They were getting closer to the classroom and the students were sitting on the benches, waiting for them to arrive. Dan nodded towards them to warn Phil, so that he didn’t say anything too loud.

Phil nodded to show that he understood what Dan meant and Dan huffed out a relieved breath.

Phil was sometimes a little slow with understanding stuff like that.

An example was back in high school when Dan wanted to be discreet about their relationship and he warned Phil about incoming strangers when they were sat on a bench outside eating ice cream. He hadn’t gotten the hint and continued to give Dan small kisses on the cheek, even though he had hissed at him a million times. It was when the strangers caught Phil’s glimpse that he understood, and Dan had been both angry and embarrassed.

He couldn’t help but laugh at it when he thought about it now, chuckling quietly as they unlocked the classroom.

“What are you laughing at?” Phil whispered loudly, failing embarrassingly hard at this whole being discreet thing.

“Nothing, stop talking to me. Being discreet, remember?” Dan whispered back harshly and stepped inside the classroom, ignoring Phil’s apology and stopping to paying attention to his actions.

Unfortunately, someone had seen the little interaction they had and the rumour had already been spread around the class.

“So you are reunited now I see?” Anna spoke up, making the whole class snicker. Dan bit his lower lip to fight back a smile that threatened to give it all away. He glanced over to Phil just to find him in the same situation.

Instead, he rolled his eyes and cleared his throat.

“Anna, are you having troubles remembering what I told you last time?”

“I’m sorry Sir, it just slipped.” She gave him an apologetic smile.

“What was that?” Phil muttered lowly.

“She just got on my nerve the other day.” His boyfriend- and yes, his heart's _still_ pounding, thank you very much- explained.

“Oh? What did she do?”

“Acted like a twat.”

The clock dragged on the wall and Phil just tapped on his desk aimlessly, supervising the students whether they were working on their songs.

It was a mix of noise and harmony inside the room.

If only it weren’t for Dan’s piano he could’ve yelled at the students for being so noisy.

He watch Dan beam at a boy who showed the chords for the chorus of his group.

“Well done.” The brown-haired teacher gave him a thumbs up.

_God, Phil could just melt at that smile._

All the while, Dan’s not feeling too comfy as well.

He could feel Phil’s icy eyes pierce his back as they trailed all over his body.

He’d be lying (again) if he said it didn’t make him flustered.

He’d also be lying (again) if he said he doesn’t want to straddle Phil right now and make-out in front of the class.

But then again, he needed this job.

_For fuck’s sake_.

He saw a girl call Phil to their group, making the man stand up immediately and jog to their spot on the floor.

And she- _oh no she did fucking not_.

‘Is she holding his arm?’ Dan let out a small sound of impatience. ‘Alright Dan, calm your fucking tits.’

He glanced at the pale man and he saw him almost crumbling and freaking out at the touch of the student.

_Fucking hell, she had the nerve to flirt with his boyfriend_.

Then Dan laughed quietly.

That’s the fucking thing.

They’re not out yet.

They don’t know (despite rumours and Gilbert) about his and Phil’s relationship.

Dan may or may not have slammed his head on the piano.

“What’s wrong?” he heard Phil query when he heard the sudden bang at the piano.

“I hate this.” Dan mumbled back, too low for the students to hear him. “I wanna kiss you right now.”

“Dan!” Phil scolded with a rosy tinge on his cheeks. He quickly looked around and squeezed his arm. “Maybe later.”

“Really?” The brunet’s eyes twinkled with anticipation. He abruptly stood up from his chair, gaining full attention from the class.

“So Phil and I decided to let you out fifteen minutes early if you could finish today’s requirement fast.”

The class cheered and motivation was suddenly in the air.

“Dan, that’s too early!” Phil scolded at him again, but Dan was too lost in his desperation to be ‘with’ Phil at the moment.

The next minutes went on swimmingly and before Dan knew the students were streaming out of the Music room.

“Finally.” He sighed in relief and jogged towards the entrance to lock the door.

He was about to turn around but Phil already slammed his hand beside him, cornering him against the smooth wood.

“Phil I think we shouldn’t do this on the door-” The younger was about to protest but Phil already silenced his whining words with his soft lips instead.

And again, Dan would be lying if he said he doesn’t want to do this against the door.

* * *

_“Out of all places, you chose the abandoned bathroom?!” Phil complained as Dan pulled him through the door and locking it back._

_“Shut the fuck up.” Dan slammed his lips on Phil and- **yep** , maybe Phil should shut up._


	15. Stardusters//Finale

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which they are boring-ass teachers with a boring-ass relationship. In which they are supposed to be history, but then it didn’t look like it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Listen to Lullabye [here](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G2pxapYforM)  
>  **this chapter contains mature content**  
>  (originally posted by [constipatedhowell](http://constipatedhowell.tumblr.com) and [athletichowell](http://athletichowell.tumblr.com) from tumblr)

**_One year later_ **

Time passed quickly.

Dan almost found it a bit scary, how time passed by him without stopping for anything or anyone. How it would _never_ stop moving and just increase in speed as he grew older.

He didn’t want to age. He wanted to be this young forever because as happy as he was now, he had never been.

It was impossible to believe that it was almost _two years_ had already passed since he and Phil got back together. When he thought back at it, it felt like it happened just a week ago. The feelings he felt back then didn’t feel as distant as they should after one year’s time.

He got to admit that he sometimes felt them still, those butterflies and the happiness just as strong every time Phil told him that he loved him.

Though, their relationship hadn’t been exactly a dance on roses.

They had been having a lot of up and downs during these years. It had been a struggle to keep the relationship secret, and Dan had gotten very anxious every time anyone of them almost fucked it up. Those moments did often lead up to arguments, which wasn’t one of the most peaceful ones.

Luckily, that wasn’t a problem anymore since they eventually learned how to behave around each other to lower the suspicion. Sure, people knew that they weren’t enemies to death anymore, but that wasn’t something Dan had anything against.

Phil had always wanted to out them as soon as possible, but Dan held tight to his opinion.

Not yet.

He was sat on the sofa in their now shared apartment, waiting for Phil to get ready for the high school reunion they were going to.

They had been living in the same apartment for a year now, but it never failed to impress and make him happy every time he thought about it. To share an apartment with the man he loved the most; that was certainly not something he thought was going to happen a few years back. _Especially_ not a very nice apartment like this one.

Every time he looked back on how messy and complicated it had been before he and Phil got back together, he laughed at himself.

The principle of not looking back and keep looking forward he still stood by today, but how he had played it off was what he was laughing at. He didn’t understand why it meant so much to him and why it would tick him off so easily.

He knew that back then it was the biggest deal ever. He could understand that it was important to him then but when he thinks back now, he couldn’t care less about it. What the old him didn’t know was that taking the decision to let go of that pride, was one of the best decisions he was going to do in his entire life.

“I’m soon done!” Came Phil’s voice from the bathroom and Dan snapped out from his thoughts, rolling his eyes at Phil’s statement.

“You’ve said that for about 10 minutes now!” Dan shouted back.

“I know, but I mean it this time!”

Dan rolled his eyes again and huffed out a laugh. He had been ready for about 15 minutes and if Phil wasn’t done in 5 minutes, they would be late.

Phil appeared in the lounge door panting, looking desperately at Dan.

“Where is my second sock?!”

Dan looked down on his feet and it was only the left one which was covered with blue. He sighed loudly and reached to grab the second sock which was lying beside him on the sofa, throwing it to Phil.

“Here it is, you nerd.” He scoffed and Phil stuck out his tongue.

“Thank you, dork.”

Dan shook his head at his boyfriend. If someone was a dork here, it was _him_.

“Oh well,” He stood up from the sofa. “You better be done now, or else we are going to be late.”

Phil’s eyes widened and hurried out from the lounge again.

“You should’ve told me we were _this_ late!” He whined from the hallway.

“I thought you knew!” Dan shouted and walked down the stairs to put his shoes on. He was starting feel a bit stressed out by now. Phil was always so _agonisingly_ slow _._

A honk was heard from outside the apartment and Dan groaned in frustration from the lack of Phil’s presence in the hall.

“ _Phil!_ ” He growled. “The taxi is here now!”

Phil appeared on the top of the stairs with a stressed look on his face and a messily done shirt.

“I’m here, I’m ready!” He ran down the stairs, with his hands fumbling with the shirt’s buttons, not paying attention as to where he set his feet. A small cry was heard from him when he missed a step and tripped over his own foot, losing balance and falling down the last steps.

Dan couldn’t help but laugh loudly at what had just happened, Phil lying on the floor whining about how it hurt.

“Are you okay?” Dan asked through his laughing cramps and offered a hand to help Phil up on his feet.

“I’m fine, my knee just hurts a little.” Phil groaned while he tried to put his shoe on with his temporary hurting knee, looking like a clumsy 5 year old. After a lot of complaint, he finally managed to put both his shoes and his jacket on without any further accidents.

“Are you _finally_ ready to leave now? The taxi driver is probably angry at us by now.”

“Yeah, no wait my shoe la-”

Dan grabbed Phil’s arm, literally dragging him out from the apartment, ignoring the older’s protests.

“Ouch, my knee, Dan!”

“ _Come on.”_

* * *

“I can’t believe Cat attended the high school reunion.” Dan blurted as they were strolling down the park the party’s venue was near at.

“Yeah. She changed a lot didn’t she? Used to be lonely and quiet. She seems happier now.” Phil muttered and swung their linked hands, then Dan giggled at how childish Phil is acting.

“What’s wrong?” He asked a few moments later and turned to face Phil, the moonlight gleaming on his ocean blue pools. “Your hand’s sweaty all of a sudden.”

He felt Phil stiffen in his hold.

“I…I’ve been thinking about something.” The paler- if he could get anymore paler here in the dark- confessed, bowing his head low.

“What about?”

“Us.”

“Oh?”

“I’m thinking about our relationship.”

Oh god.

Oh god, no.

Phil’s breaking up with him, isn’t he? Fuck.

Was it because of how Dan yelled at him when he dropped his plate on at four in the morning? Or was it when Dan’s repeatedly said ‘I hate you’s despite them meaning the opposite?

 _God_.

“W-what about our relationship?” The brunet choked on a dry sob and diverted his gaze from Phil. He doesn’t want him to see his tears when he breaks them off.

“I don’t want to be your boyfriend anymore, Dan.”

_Jesus fucking Christ._

There it goes.

Did he really had to be _so_ blunt about it?

“Dan? Please say something.” Phil called, worry in his tone.

“I can’t say anything, Phil.” Dan replied and sobbed quietly again.

“Can I continue, then?”

What?

“I don’t want to be your boyfriend anymore because I…” He watched the other man kneel on one knee and prop open a velvet box.

Dan could barely feel his heart beat.

“Because I want to be your husband.” Phil sputtered and blushed hard, still not daring to look at his hopefully fiancé. “So um- _god how do you do this_ \- um, Daniel James Howell, will you please marry me and answer soon because I feel like I’m melting down the drain near my foot.”

But he didn’t hear Dan say anything but throw his arms at him, bawling loudly.

“H-hey, what’s wrong?” Phil panicked.

“I thought you were breaking up on me!” Dan hit his chest lightly.

“I’m not? Dan. Dan, look at me.”

Then Dan did.

“I love you so much, get that? I told you years ago I can’t function without seeing you for at least a minute a day, how could I bring myself to break up with you?”

He saw Dan break into a smile despite the tears in his face.

“So again, Daniel James Howell, will you please stop being my boyfriend and become my husband instead?” He queried again, holding up the golden band between his index finger and thumb.

“Christ, _yes_.” The tanner grabbed the ring and slid it down his finger, grinning on how it nicely shone under the moonlight.

“Phil?” He called after processing the fact that _he_ is about to marry Phil soon.

“Yeah?”

He pressed their lips softly, tasting that never-endingly sweet taste of Phil’s lips. “I love you so, so, _so_ much.”

“I love you much more than that, sorry.” Phil chuckled and pecked Dan again, this time on the nose.

“No way.” Dan argued, but smiled still when Phil’s lips brushed against his nose.

“How about we agree on the idea we love each other on the maximum level equally?”

“Fine.”

They walked by home, hand-in-hand again.

But something was different.

Because one of the swaying hands in the dark, had a shining ring with it.

* * *

The wedding was fast, they held it after the next two weeks. They didn’t invite anyone besides their family and close friends, not even one person from school invited. They weren’t out yet, after all.

In all honesty, Dan still couldn’t believe he’s married to Phil.

Phil’s his.

And he’s Phil’s.

And it _couldn’t_ be any more perfect.

“Do you want to adopt children on some time?” Phil popped the question while they were showering for the first time after marrying, their rings sitting on the bathroom sink.

“Maybe. I’d want a daughter.” Dan shrugged. He doesn’t really know if he’s ready to settle down yet.

Well, he’s got a point for they both had jobs that required them the whole day.

“Please?” The other purred to his ear, his breath tingling his ear’s shell.

“Mm, I’m thinking about it.” But Phil was too lost on groping his bum. “Plus, the process is pretty long too, we’d need to do interviews and shit.”

“Yeah but I think it’s pretty worth it.” And the coal-haired man’s voice was already muffled from burying his face in the crook of Dan’s neck. “I’d want a family with you any day.”

Yet Dan could moan as Phil played with his nipples while whispering about domesticity to him. “This is unfair.”

“It’s not babe.” Phil chuckled and licked a strip on his nape. “I’m asking you nicely.”

The brunet snorted in return. “Sure you are. We’ll talk about this later, alright? Just put your dick inside me- oh _god_.”

He fumbled with his words for he was taken in by the sudden feeling of Phil’s length inside him.

“Jesus Christ, you didn’t even fucking stretch me.” He hissed as Phil pushed him further to the wall, the water spraying down their heated bodies.

“Babe I fucked you twice last night, one was even with a dildo. Do you still think you need stretching?”

“Ugh, fuck. M-move.” Dan demanded.

“Can you turn around? Maybe you could ride me here?”

And of course, the younger didn’t need to think about it.

He span around as soon as Phil’s shaft left him, before wrapping his legs around Phil’s waist and caught his wet lips for a hungry kiss.

“Too eager now, are we?” Phil teased as Dan pushed himself down on his length, acting as if he’s in a hurry.

“Shut up. We’re wasting water right now so we need to do this quick.”

But Phil shook his head and twisted the shower tap, closing off any water that dared to fall down on them. “You and your excuses.”

“Sorry, I’m still a horny teenager after all.” Dan laughed but immediately slid into a moan when Phil roughly pressed him on the bathroom wall, his length buried deep in his ass.

“Fuck me faster, will you?”

The demandingness of Dan never failed to impress him. What a bossy bottom for an _adult_.

He thrust up fast, hitting Dan’s prostate on one go. Probably because due to countless nights of sex.

“Try to meet my thrusts, yeah?” He panted on Dan’s ear as he complied, his arms wrapped around his neck tightly.

“Fuck- Phil.” Dan groaned wantonly and pushed himself down again while his fingers buried deep on Phil’s back.

“Why can’t you even wait in the bedroom? At least we have lube over there.” Phil grunted but of course, he’s not complaining. The lack of lube made their sex rougher and more skin-to-skin contact. And the feeling of his dick burning against Dan’s walls is just the _best_ in the world.

“Touch me, P-Phil.” He heard Dan demand again, his tongue lolling out and face flushed that was definitely not caused by the hot water of their shower.

But Phil still obliged and wrapped his hand around Dan’s shaft, pumping it quick.

“God- oh my god- PhilPhil I’m close, _Jesus_ \- I’m so fucking close-“ Then he cut off his own words by moaning Phil’s name loudly while his load spilled against their chest.

Phil then pushed his hips again for a few thrusts, before following Dan cumming inside him.

“Goodness.” Dan panted on Phil’s neck, turning limp.

“We’ve done this approximately more than ten times, still not used on having _steamy_ showers?”

“Please shut up.”

* * *

“So what do you think?” Phil queried while they were cuddling on their bed.

“About what?” Dan replied with his face twisting into confusion.

“About earlier, about us, adopting.”

“I don’t know, Phil. Don’t you think we’re going too fast?”

“True, but I wanted to know what your answer is so we can file for an interview. Mind you, the process takes years so I want to do it as early as possible.”

“I want to, don’t worry. I just don’t want to rush everything yet. We just got married last week, you know.”

“I get what you mean but…I really want to have a family with you.”

“We will.” Dan smiled at him in the dark, kissing his forehead softly. “Soon, kay?”

“M’kay.”

“Night Philly.”

“Don’t call me that.”

“Love you too.”

“Love you too, Danny.”

“I’m sorry I won’t call you Philly ever again.”

Dan swore he heard Phil snort.

* * *

“Are you serious?” Phil gaped at his husband who held up his laptop, beaming proudly at the email he had just received.

“Yes!” Dan excitedly answered.

“I can’t believe this!”

“You think you’re the only one?” Dan snickered and pushed his laptop to Phil so he can read the email.

“Dear Mr. and Mr. Lester,” Phil read out loud and scrunched his nose. “What?”

“Memory check: we’re married.”

“Oh. I still can’t get over that, sorry.” The older grinned before continuing. “We have received your application for adoption six months ago, and we have decided to give you a chance; one of our workers will come to your house today, an interview will take place.”

“What?”

But Phil ignored him. “They will arrive at your flat at one pm sharp. We wish your adoption process would push through. Sincerely, the London Adoption Centre.”

“Phil what time is it?”

“It’s…fuck! It’s 12 pm- oh nonono.”

“Babe, calm down.” Dan hushed him and held him tightly for a hug. “Let’s clean our flat quick and change our clothes afterwards, alright? Then we do the interview.”

“I don’t know Dan, I’m not prepared. What if I fuck up? What if we don’t get accepted because we have to work the whole day in school?”

“Phil...”

“Maybe I should resign and be a YouTuber instead, I could get more money too.”

“Phil.”

“ _What_?”

“You told me one year ago that you really wanted to have a family. Is that how you will start a family when you’re already fussing about it?”

“I’m sorry.” He just melted in Dan’s arms.

“It’s fine. I want you to calm down and then we’ll fight the bitch. Also known as the worker they will send.”

Phil giggled at Dan’s words and felt his heartbeat slow down. “Thanks bear.”

“Anything for you.” The brunet smiled gently at him before leaning down for a kiss. “Let’s get cleaning?”

“Okay.”

On the next few hours, it all happened like a blur. They didn’t even know how they did it. But they knew they enjoyed talking to Martha, the worker who was sent.

She reassured them that they won’t have to worry of not being accepted because of their jobs as long as they don’t pick anyone under three, because three and up children had school, meaning they wouldn’t be home as well.

And on that moment, she knew she saw both men’s eyes gleam with relief. Fucking gay dads. Sometimes she wished some straight parents were as adorable as gay parents, who’d actually go through all this just so they could have a happy family, as compared to straight parents, they would just have sex and sometimes even call their own child a mistake. She sighed and smiled before leaving.

She knew the Lesters are going to be the perfect family.

* * *

“Oh welcome to our centre, Mr. Phil and Mr. Dan.” Martha greeted when the men she interviewed a few days ago stepped inside the building. She guessed they got accepted.

“Please, just call us Dan and Phil.” Phil shot her an assuring smile.

“Very well, Phil. Please go this way for the children. Then tell us the name who you’d want before we file them in.”

She saw the other man, Dan, jump slightly in excitement and gripped his husband’s arm tightly, his eyes literally showing off his energy.

“We are not going to a pet shop, Dan.” Phil groaned but gave him still a small smile.

“I know. I’m just excited, you know. Also nervous. I want a little girl, Phil. Can we get a little girl?” Dan asked.

“Of course.”

They walked down the hall Martha led them too and glanced inside the windows that showed the children playing inside the room. They all looked so adorable.

“I like her, Phil!” Dan exclaimed again as he pointed at a brunette.

“She looks like you.”

“No way.”

“Did you cheat on me?”

“I’m gay as fuck do you think I’d cheat on you with a _girl_?”

“Dan, language!”

“Sorry.” The brunet smiled sheepishly as they continued walking down the hall as they pointed out potential children they’d want to take home. In all honestly, they want to take all of the children home.

They reached the end of the hall, a door that opened to a playground.

There were more children than both had expected.

One was crying because an older boy won’t let him ride a swing, one was laughing because a girl’s ice cream fell down, and a group of children played hopscotch near the fence.

The couple blinked around the playground to see if anyone caught their eye. Sadly, none did.

They were about to retreat back inside the hall, deciding the girl named Noemi is what they were going to take home when they heard soft footsteps running after them.

Both turned around to see a girl that seemed to be around the age of seven, looking up at them with shining green eyes.

They stared at each other for a few seconds, before the girl spoke up.

“Philly?” She called with a big smile.

Then Phil realized who this girl was and why she looked _so_ familiar.

“Darcy!” He smiled and picked her up.

“You didn’t jump!” She grinned back at him.

‘Jump?’ Dan racked his brain about any incident regarding Phil and jumping. There wasn’t any. Unless Phil haven’t said it to him yet.

“Yeah I didn’t ‘cause you told me not to.”

“I’m very proud, Philly.” She gave him a toothy grin before trailing her eyes to Dan. “Who’s your friend, Philly?”

“He’s my husband Dan.”

Her small hands covered her mouth, looking shocked. “You’re married?”

“I am.” Phil nudged Dan slightly, gesturing him to smile at Darcy.

“Hi, I’m Dan.” He waved at her.

“Hi Danny!” He cringed at the name. “I’m Darcy.”

“Hello Darcy.” Then he looked at Phil. “Do you want to come home with us?”

“What? Are you serious?” Phil gazed at him with his eyes wide. “You’d want Darcy to take home?”

“Oh please. You already look like father and child.” Dan giggled.

“Well what do you think, Darcy? Do you want to come home with us?” Phil prompted the child.

“Yes! Yes please!” She exclaimed and raised her arms in excitement.

“Alright, let’s settle this down with Martha then.” The paler set her down. “Be ready to come home with us!”

“Yeah!”

And Dan could only smile at how adorable Phil is, even though there was a sick feeling in his gut about what Darcy had said earlier.

The filing process happened easy and quickly, and before they knew, they had tucked Darcy to her bed (which was currently Dan’s bed, they’d have to shop for her things soon).

“Hey babe?” Dan called, looking up at Phil from their cuddle.

“Mn?”

He reached up and kissed him slowly before slipping in his tongue, making them groan softly.

“We can’t do this as often now.” Phil sighed as he rested his forehead against Dan.

“I know.” Dan apologetically smiled and kissed him again.

“I want to ask you something.” He expressed when they parted away moments later.

“Whats’it?” His husband replied, his voice already slurred and thick from sleepiness.

“What did Darcy mean by ‘You didn’t jump’?”

Then Phil stiffened.

“I’m not pushing you to tell me about it, I’m just worried on what she meant.”

But Phil just sighed once more. “Remember when I gave you a handjob on the music room?”

Dan spluttered in Phil’s arms. “W-why are you bringing that up _now_?”

“You still haven’t returned the favour.” Phil pouted and Dan rolled his eyes.

He swiftly went under the duvet and pulled down Phil’s boxers.

They lay in silence again after Dan’s blowjob, their chests pounding gently together.

“I tried to jump on the park’s river on the day I didn’t go to work.” Phil blurted suddenly, his voice tired and still husky for he just rode out his orgasm.

“You did _what_?” Dan knew it was his fault why Phil did that. He fucked him up, after all.

“I was about to jump but Darcy found me, pleading me not to jump because his dad already did and her mum left her afterwards.”

“Oh.”

“Yeah.”

“I’m sorry.”

“For what?”

“For making you do that.”

“Dan,”

“Don’t. We both know it’s my fault why you were about to do that.”

“Okay.”

“I’m glad you didn’t though.”

“Me too.”

They were once again huddled close as their lips moved together but pried off when their door creaked open.

“Daddy?” They heard Darcy’s small voice call through the dark. Both smiled at how she eagerly started calling them with ‘dad’ names; ‘daddy’ for Dan and ‘papa’ for Phil. It was the most adorable.

“Yes?” Dan answered.

“You can’t sleep?” Phil added shortly.

They heard her close the door and her footsteps reach their bed, the light of the moon showing her crying face.

“Oh dear.” Dan reached over and picked her up, then placed her gently between him and Phil.

“You could’ve told us you can’t sleep alone.” Phil muttered but nevertheless wrapped an arm between his- _oh no his heart can’t take it he still can’t believe it_ \- family. “You should tell us before we go to bed if you want to sleep with us, okay?”

“Okay!” Darcy agreed gleefully.

“Papa?” She called again.

“Can you sing me a song?”

Phil’s face flooded red at her request and he knew Dan is smirking at him right now.

“I will. If your daddy would agree on playing the piano.” He snickered.

“Phil!” Dan hushed at him loudly.

“Really, daddy? Will you play the piano for me too?”

“Oh alright.” The brunet grumbled and sat up, turning on the night lamp. He walked over to his piano and started playing.

Phil then joined in, softly singing the lyrics of Fall Out boy’s ‘Lullabye’. Okay- yes, this is their child and they really shouldn’t expose her already to Fall Out Boy; but that’s the only lullaby they knew aside from Tili Tili Bom. In which they are never going to sing in a thousand of years.

 _“Honey is for bees silly bear, besides there’s jelly beans everywhere.”_ He sang as he gently stroked her hair. _“It’s not what it seems in the land of dreams, don’t worry your head just go to sleep.”_

He loved how Dan’s piano easily melts along his voice. _“It doesn’t matter how you feel, life is just a Ferris wheel. It’s always up and down, don’t make a sound._

 _“When you wake up the world will come around.”_ He sang the line repeatedly, before smiling at Darcy’s sleeping form. He continued, still.

 _“It’s just the sweet weather and the peacock feathers, in the morning it will all be better. It’s not what it seems in the land of dreams, don’t worry your head just go to sleep. When you wake up the world will come around,_ ”

Phil sang the chorus again, before looking up at Dan and smiling widely.

“I guess you could say we are the best parents in the world already.” Dan chuckled.

“Agreed.”

“Say Phil?”

“Yeah?”

“It’s school time again in three days right?”

“Mm.”

“Do you think we could tell the teachers about our relationship?”

Phil’s heart hammered against his chest.

“W-why yes!” He happily muttered, afraid they might wake up Darcy. “I’ve always wanted to years ago!”

“Then maybe the students afterwards? We don’t need to do something grand, I could just say I’m married to you.”

“I know. But do you know that I love you?” Phil grinned at him.

“I do. And I love you too.”

“N’ I l’ve y’too.” They heard Darcy mumble below. Despite being sleepy she probably heard the sappiest part of their conversation.

“And we love you very much, our lil munchkin.”

Phil giggled at Dan’s nickname for Darcy, before wrapping his arms around them and finally drifting off to sleep.

* * *

For the next three days, they shopped for Darcy’s clothes and toys then enrolled her to the school they were both teaching at. And both smiled when they registered her as Darcy Lester.

When Monday came, everything was in a rush. Phil bathed Darcy first as Dan prepared breakfast. Then the men shared showers (also gaining an ‘ew’ from Darcy to which they just laughed at) before eating quickly together.

“Are you sure you’ll be alright?” Phil fussed around Darcy as they walked her to the elementary division.

“Papa I told you I’m A-OK!” Darcy giggled and kissed her dads cheeks goodbye.

Both were thankful no one was exactly around to see her do that.

“So how are we coming out to the teachers?” Phil asked as they were climbing up the stairs, their hands still linked for there were not many students around yet.

“I have an idea.” Dan smirked next to him.

“And what is that idea, my gorgeous husband?” The coal-haired smirked back and played along.

“Can you still act?”

“I think so. You’re the one who’s good in acting though.”

Dan blushed at Phil, who grinned slyly on his reaction. “Thanks. Anyway, I’m thinking you’re gonna come up to Gilbert, wave him a ‘hi’ and you wish him another year of good work. Then knowing him, he should notice your ring and say ‘woah Phil you’re married!?’ then he should look at me and I’m going to pretend it’s not me by looking grim and sad.” He uttered. “Then he should ask you ‘so who is the lucky girl’ and then you cough and we bring our hands up together.”

“Dan I’m not sure how calm their reaction would be when we do that.”

“That’s the point, babe! A little payback for all the teasing they have done?”

“Fine.”

They reached the high school division and looked around quickly. When they saw no one was in sight, they kissed softly and pulled away fast, in case someone walks by.

“Love you.” Dan mumbled and released his hand after giving it a hard squeeze.

“Love you too.” Phil smiled. “Now go and pretend you’re grumpy and mad. Make sure you hide your ring. Then I’ll come in afterwards so they won’t be suspicious when they see us come in together.”

“Sure.”

Dan entered the room, pulling on his ‘depressed and annoyed’ look. Phil realized he barely looked like that anymore ever since they got back together. Either way, Dan is going to look like that again once Gilbert’s-

“Ohh, Dan! Welcome back my boy!”

There he goes.

“Leave me alone, Gilbert.” Dan ‘grumbled’.

“But where’s the fun if I left you alone?”

Phil decided he should come in at this point, to save Dan because he sounded really annoyed at Gilbert and of course, to continue their little prank.

“Phil!” Gilbert exclaimed as he entered the room.

“He’s been like that the whole morning.” He heard Alex moan from annoyance and wink flirtatiously at him. Ugh, Dan could do so much better than him.

“Hi Gilbert!” He made sure that his golden ring can be seen by everyone on the room.

Then he watched Dan’s face pull into a frown.

“Woah, Phil! You’re married!?” Phil had to stop himself from laughing because Dan got what he will say exactly.

He shifted his feet and blushed. “Yeah.”

He saw Gilbert look back at Dan, but Dan has a grim expression and did his papers, so he made it look like he wasn’t paying attention and it wasn’t him.

Gilbert had a mild disappointed look. But beamed at him anyway. “So who’s the lucky girl?!”

Phil could’ve snorted but he knew that it will only destroy the act him and Dan are pulling.

He saw Dan look at him and nod slightly.

“Um-“ He coughed and raised his hand again, this time joined by Dan, who also flashed his golden ring that matched Phil’s.

Then shouting.

Then people grumbling and shoving money aggressively into Gilbert’s face.

“One at a time!” He snickered and placed each pound giddily on his wallet.

“You were _betting_ on _us_?!” Dan cried and ruffled his hair, before walking to Phil’s desk.

“Of course we were! They were all against the idea of you getting together but me, and now I’m the richest man in this room!”

“Ugh.” Dan and Phil grumbled in unison. But both are glad. At least they took it nicely than they expected.

“By the way, can you not tell the students yet? We want to come out to them on our own?” Phil requested and rested his head on Dan’s shoulder; a little bit of affection wouldn’t hurt.

Their co-workers agreed (Gilbert included but doubtful).

When everything’s settled down, Dan looked at Phil, who was sorting his papers. He can’t believe that before, he used to stare and glare at him from afar, but now his eyes are directed to him and screaming ‘I love Philip Lester’.

“Howell?” Dan heard some teacher snap him out of his gaze on Phil.

“What?”

“I said your class is starting soon.”

“Oh. Thanks.”

“I’m gonna go now, see you babe.” He faced Phil again and planted a kiss on his lips, forgetting the fact that they were in the teachers’ lounge and now Gilbert was squealing like a school girl and some people giving them wolf whistles.

“Shut up.” Dan grumbled at them but the blush on his cheeks didn’t make it work.

“Oh let them be.” Phil smiled at him before pecking him as well. “See you soon, too.”

* * *

Dan Howell stared at the clock on the wall. But not only the clock stared back, but so did thirty-three pairs of eyes. It was his  _sixth_ year of being a new teacher, yet having a new batch still manages to shake his knees.

“I would truly appreciate it if you called me…” He hesitated for a bit. What should he say? Should he use Phil’s last name? Or should he keep his name? No. He inwardly shook his head and opened his mouth to speak but was interrupted by a loud bang from the door (even though he left it open).

It was Darcy.

“Surprise!” She ran to him and Dan picked her up immediately due to habits. He felt the students eye him and Darcy.

“What are you doing here, sweet?” He asked with a gentle smile.

“Teacher Eliza told us to explore the school on our first day so I was exploring around and I saw you!”

“Really?” Dan asked genuinely. Darcy is just an angel for him and Phil.

“Really!”

“Oh by the way, class, this is Darcy.” He then faced Darcy. “Say hi to them Munchkin.”

“Hi Darcy!” The class greeted in chorus, actually finding Darcy interesting.

“Hi!” The girl replied as happily as she could.

“Whose daughter is she, sir?” A student queried.

“Ours.” He heard a deep voice answer softly from the door, the class barely hearing it. Him and Darcy immediately snapped to where it came from and sure enough, Phil was there smiling smugly. He suddenly forgot the students when he did.

“May I come in?” He asked tentatively.

“Sure.”

“Hi guys, I’m Phil Lester, by the way, the English teacher.” He greeted.

 _At least there’s no best friend after it_.

“Anyways, ba- Phil,” He had to pinch himself to stop calling Phil babe. “What brings you here?”

“Did Darcy burst into your class all of a sudden?”

“Yeah.”

“Darcy, you shouldn’t do that.” Dan needed to bite his lip from snickering because Phil sounded like total mother.

“Sorry Papa.”

“Alright, come here.”

Dan put down Darcy and she ran to her papa.

“Okay, let’s go. Did we interrupt anything?”

“Just like three years ago, when you interrupted my introduction.”

“Oops sorry. Come on Darcy, let’s go to Papa’s class instead.”

“No, stay.” Dan pressed on and faced the students again. “Sorry about that.” He cleared his throat. “As I was saying, I would truly appreciate it if you called me Mr. Lester.”

* * *

There was a lot of screaming, of course. There were also lots of crying and laughing. Some people saw it coming, some people were completely thrown back.

Either way, it made Dan and Phil the utmost happy when their school eagerly accepted their relationship.

They were now walking home, Darcy in between them, giggling at some stupid joke Dan had made.

“Look Daddy, look Papa! Look at the stars!” The girl pointed towards the sky, interrupting the men.

They looked up towards the sky, and the stars were indeed shining bright this night.

“Would you look at that.” Phil gasped and Dan laughed from beside him.

“Impressed, Lester?”

“Maybe I am, uh- _Lester._ ” Dan snorted at his husband’s failed attempt to make a comeback.

“Idiot.”

“Papa?” Darcy tugged at Phil’s shirt. “Why are the stars broken?”

“No Darcy,” Phil laughed. “They aren’t broken.”

A frown formed on the little girl’s face.

“But, why are they so spread out, then? Don’t they feel lonely?”

“Look.” Phil crouched beside Darcy and pointed towards the sky. She curiously looked up towards where her father pointed. “Do you see those stars?”

She nodded.

“If you connect them…” He moved his finger in between the stars to create the constellation Aries and the girl’s eyes followed every movement. “...you get constellations.”

“Constellations?” She asked, her eyes big with wonder.

“It means that anything broken can create something big and beautiful in the end.”

Dan, who stood by and watched everything, felt a familiar warm feeling spreading in his body.

_Anything broken can create something big and beautiful in the end._

He couldn’t help but smile to himself, looking at his husband with a gaze full of love. That was exactly how he would describe his and Phil’s relationship throughout the years, and he wondered if Phil got the metaphor himself.

When Phil and Darcy were done with looking up at the stars, Dan grabbed Phil’s hand.

“Something big and beautiful, huh?” Dan asked and Phil met his gaze, a heartwarming smile spreading across his face.

“You understood.”

“Of course I did, I’m not stupid.” The younger squeezed his husband’s hand.

“Sometimes you are, actually.” The other scoffed and Dan kicked his foot, the older protesting loudly.

“You nerd.” Dan laughed, and pecked his mouth. “I love you.”

Phil smiled and kissed him back.

“I love you, too.”

* * *

_“Dan? Honey?” Mrs. Howell poked her head inside her son’s room, a worried expression was shown by her face._

_“Go away mum.” Dan groaned back, tightening his grip on his duvet._

_“But you haven’t eaten since you’ve went home from Phil’s-” A sharp pain went to Dan’s ears at the mention of his **ex-boyfriend’s** name. “-house. Are you sure you’re not hungry?”_

_“I told you I’m not. Go away.”_

_He heard the door shut and squeezed his eyes closed once again, trying to forget the image of someone with black hair and blue eyes and breathtaking._

_It’s impossible._

_He scrambled up his bed and ran to his dresser, then started to rip off every picture he and Phil had taken. Afterwards, he proceeded to delete every picture they have on his phone, wincing every time he sees how happy they were._

_Dan dreamed._

_He dreamed being with Phil._

_He dreamed being with Phil and living with him._

_He dreamed being with Phil, living with him, and having a family with him._

_Is that too much to ask?_

_All he wants is a happy ending._

_Except that happy endings don’t exist._

_Nevertheless, Dan still wished._

_He still wished over those broken and barely shining stars in the dark sky that maybe, just **maybe** , he could be by Phil’s side and whisper 'I love you' to him once again._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **Alice** : [incoherent sobbing] [unstable screaming] im so sad patrick is finally done. patrick is a grown man now. [grossly blows nose] im not ok. i love collabing with sofie so much. we have grown so much closer thanks to fos and thanks to that, we bully his brother now and we don’t water plants anymore. it’s also a fun ride bc we thought we wouldn’t be able to do this, like, we already started to lose hope when we thinking of the title. but then yeah, we managed. will we do more collabs??? maybe for pbb. who knows. amirite sof? anyways, i hope you enjoyed this fic as much as we did. (pst nominate us for best collab in the phanfic awards) k guys, i love you very much ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)  
>  **Sofie** : IT’S OVER. IM A SOBBING MESS. im actually so sad ive such a great time writing this I dont want it to be over. i hope you enjoyed our last and final chapter my loves, we put our heart and soul in this. I LOVE PATRICK (this chapter has over 6k words omfg)


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